
Oass_3>S_lAA5 

Book HL34 

CopyjightU 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



THE BOOK OF JOB 

AN INSPIRED DRAMA 



REVEALING THE NECESSITY 
FOR SUFFERING, THE 
EFFECT OF SUFFERING, 
AND THE PHILOS OPHY 
OF THE IMPOSITION OF 
HUMAN SUFFERING 



. .•-..,,. 



I. N. MAST 

OTTUMWA, IOWA 

1904 






LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

APR 27 1904 

Copyright Entry 
CLASS a- XXc. NO. 

5" / *- ^ _ 

COPY B 



COPYRIGHT, 1904, 

BY 

I. N. MAST 



PREFACE. 



In 1892 the writer issued a small volume for 
private circulation. In it were promised additional 
writings developing the same general line of thought 
in a more matured form. That promise was not 
an idle one, and there has never been a day since 
it was made that it has not been the purpose of the 
writer to fulfill it. The delay has been because of 
the keen appreciation of the fact that each year 
was the better preparing him for the duty im- 
posed upon, and thus publicly assumed by, him. 
The present seems to be an opportune time to give 
to those who may enjoy the reading of it the fol- 
lowing paper, which is fairly complete within itself, 
upon the subjects as outlined upon the title page. 
The overwhelming sense of duty which compelled 
the publication of the preliminary book referred to 
remains unchanged. In submitting to it I can be 
happy. In resisting it I can not be other than 
depressed and miserable. I feel that the experiences 
of more than thirty years' duration, ^nd the con- 
victions which have .remained unchangeojfor more 
than fifteen years, must govern me. I cannot safely 
act upon the advice of anyone, hence it is useless 



6 THE BOOK OF JOB 

to seek it. My own sense of duty must be my only 
guide, and upon it alone I act. If there be error in 
the act, it is my own error. If there is error in 
the thoughts presented and you accept it, it is your 
error and not mine. That which I have received 
and accepted, I give. That which I may have received, 
and have not accepted, I do not give. I hold it in 
abeyance, awaiting settled conviction and judgment. 
The truths which you will find in this book are not new 
truths. They may be new to you in form of expres- 
sion or in the breadth of meaning given them. It lies 
with each for himself to determine how far he may go 
in accepting them in the form in which they are 
declared. This is a matter of indifference to me, 
for my whole duty ends in the presentation of them 
as found in the following pages. When I shall see 
my way clearly in reference thereto I shall follow 
these truths with others of the same nature which 
have come, or shall come to me, accompanied with 
a settled conviction on my own part as to their 
value for limited or general publication. 

I. N. Mast. 
Ottumwa, Iowa, January, 1904. 



CHAPTER I. 

TRUTH AND THE METHOD OF ITS DISCOVERY. 

Truth has existed from the beginning of time, 
yea, from the beginning of all existence. Truth is 
eternal, as God is eternal; but truth must be dis- 
covered. It does not come to us without effort; it 
can not come to us without effort. The effort which 
is required to acquire it is confined to no age, no 
country, no people. It belongs to all ages, all coun- 
tries, all peoples. The Book of Job is one of the 
clearest evidences of this assertion that can be pro- 
duced. Unknown as to the age which gave it birth, 
the country from which it came, or the author who 
gave expression to it, it stands as a monument 
marking the course of divine revelation to the human 
race. The mind which could conceive and accept 
the truths contained in it was no ordinary mind. 
The intellect which discovered them to mankind was 
an aided intellect. In this lies the proof that they 
were inspired. Inspiration is aided human intellect; 
aided human spiritual comprehension; aided human 
expression of conceived and accepted truth. This 
is all that there is of inspiration. This is all that 
inspiration can be. God according to his own pur- 
pose leads a human soul into a conception of truth, 
then into the acceptance of such truth, then into 
the expression and recording of such truth. When 
this has been done such truth is both divinely 
inspired and revealed. It lies beyond the reach of 



8 THE BOOK OF JOB 

the unaided soul. It may lie beyond the conception 
of the unaided soul. It may be such truth as experi- 
ence alone can bestow the knowledge of upon the 
soul. If it be the latter, such soul is led of God up 
to and through the required experience, whether it 
be to endure, to suffer or to enjoy it. In either case 
the experience is not the voluntary choice of the soul. 
It is forced upon it. Joy therein can only arise 
from the knowledge which the experience brings. 

The human soul shrinks back from the controlling 
power of destiny whenever it feels itself within its 
grasp. Doubt, dread, uncertainty lie ahead; an 
irresistible force impels. The fearful, doubting soul 
next feels itself to be within the scope of an infinite 
purpose of its God and yields in final submission. 
Then comes that trial which only comes and only can 
come to it. "Tempted of God," it has been called. 
Its meaning is known and knowable alone through 
experience. Such is the truth which Job received. 
Let us follow him in the record of it as far as it is 
permitted to us to go. 

Job was a perfect man. Job was tempted of 
God; and Job has revealed these two truths and 
declared the reasons for their existence through the 
writing which bears his name. When we say that 
Job has revealed these things we mean that God 
has revealed them through the medium of Job him- 
self. Job, unaided, was powerless to conceive or 
to express these truths, because they lie beyond the 
range of unaided human comprehension. A human 
soul may be led by slow degrees into the compre- 
hension of spiritual truths, which truths it, unaided, 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 9 

would be absolutely powerless to acquire. Having 
been so led it may express and record such truths 
for the benefit of other souls seeking them. This 
is what happened to Job and what Job did. In 
following this record we will outline our thoughts 
as follows: 

1st. The soul which is thus led must be itself 
perfect. 

2nd. It must pass through some preparatory 
training and experience. 

3rd. It must assume and bear responsibilities 
which no other soul assumes or bears. 

4th. These responsibilities must be forced upon 
it against its will. 

5th. When its will has finally yielded to the 
divine will, its yielding constitutes a covenant 
between it and its God, which covenant God cannot 
break, and it cannot break without sin. 

All this Job experienced, suffered, and then 
rejoiced in. 

1st. God uses means in accomplishing his ends, 
and in this man imitates God. If man would accom- 
plish perfect ends, then the means used by him 
therefor must be perfect for the uses required of 
them. This we can all readily comprehend because 
it comes within the range of our own experience. 
From this let us accept the same truth as applied 
to God. God purposes an end, that end to be reached 
through means. It follows that the means to be 
used must be perfectly adapted to the end to be 
reached. In this case God purposed to declare unto 



10 THE BOOK OF JOB 

man certain truths and the reasons for them, as we 
have above set forth, and he purposed to do it 
through the life and character of Job as a means 
thereto. The life and the character of Job must 
therefore be perfected as the means to be used for 
this end. In this lies the necessity for the affliction 
endured by Job and which came from the hand of 
God direct. Without such affliction Job could never 
have been prepared to receive that revelation of truth 
which came to him and which has been revealed 
through him for the benefit of all subsequent ages. 

If these assertions are true, then it follows that 
in human life some individuals are tempted, not of 
their own human nature and desires, but of God 
himself. Such temptation can only come to a soul 
as a preparation for some duty imposed up it indi- 
vidually, and separate and distinct from those duties 
common to all the human race. If this be accepted 
as truth, then it follows that God does impose upon 
individuals duties not common to all, responsibilities 
unknown to all others, and does lead such individuals 
into a comprehension of spiritual truth otherwise 
unattainable during human life. The instances of 
this stand out prominently in the record of the 
revelation of spiritual truth, which has come down 
to us. Such is God's method. Such is God's pur- 
pose. 

2nd. The next thought is that some preparation 
is necessary before any soul can travel out beyond 
the boundary of the ordinary spiritual comprehen- 
sion of truth, common to all. If it had not been for 
such special preparation in individual cases the com- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 11 

prehension of spiritual truth would have reached a 
fixed limit and would have remained stationary thereat 
throughout time; or rather would have receded 
therefrom as the intellectual powers of the race had 
developed and had thereby blunted spiritual con : 
ception. To overcome such retrogression and to lead 
the human race ever to a broader and fuller com- 
prehension of spiritual truth, God has bestowed upon 
individuals spiritual genius, which is neither more 
nor less than an abnormal development of one or 
more spiritual powers or faculties in a person 
appointed of the purpose of God for such ends 
and prepared of God for such duties. Such prep- 
aration is as essential to the comprehension of 
spiritual truth as is a special preparation necessary 
for the comprehension of physical truth. The differ- 
ence is that the latter may come of our own will and 
effort, while the former can only come from God 
direct according to his own purpose, and wholly 
without the power of human will and purpose. 

3rd. Such appointed soul must assume and 
bear responsibilities that no other assumes or bears. 
This is inevitable because of the power of spiritual 
comprehension thus bestowed upon it. To fail to 
use such power when once it is bestowed is in itself 
sin, and would sink such soul into spiritual death 
from the instant of such choice. Life is bestowed 
upon us all for a purpose. Life is not our own to 
do as we will with it. It is ours to fulfill the purpose 
of its creation, and if we, knowing such purpose, 
refuse to fulfill it, we commit sin and sink our souls 
into spiritual death through such refusal. Thus I 



12 THE BOOK OF JOB 

may not by my own will and act take my own life 
out of this human existence without sin, any more 
than I may take the life of another out of this 
existence without sin. It is our duty, one and all, 
to bear the burdens which rest upon us here, whether 
they be great or small, until such time as God's will 
releases us from our human state. 

4th. Such special responsibilities must be forced 
upon the soul against its will. If they were not, it 
might glory in them, which it may not do. Whatever 
of glory, or honor or praise there may be in them 
belongs to God who placed them and not to the soul 
which bears them. Job did not seek his affliction or 
that knowledge which came to him and which was 
bestowed upon the world through him, as the result 
of such preparation. He was humbled before his 
God and remained so to the end of his life. 

5tb. The yielding soul thus burdened with 
responsibility enters into covenant relations with 
God. Such covenant is in effect throughout its 
human existence and cannot be disregarded. What 
the terms of covenant are may be unknown to all 
except to the one who enters into it, but to such one 
there is never doubt. No one who earnestly seeks 
to know God's will can remain in doubt as to what 
such will is. 

The second great truth which is revealed to the 
world through the book of Job is this : That suffer- 
ing constitutes a necessary preparation for the soul's 
highest enjoyment of all that God has bestowed upon 
it. Is this a truth ? Can it be demonstrated ? Yes, it 
is both a truth and it can be made clear unto many. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 13 

It cannot be demonstrated to all. It is kindred to 
the truth that evil is necessary in order that good 
may exist; that a knowledge of evil is necessary in 
order that a knowledge of good may be possessed; 
that it is darkness that renders light visible; that 
it is discord that reveals harmony; that it is mental 
and physical suffering that make us conscious of 
health. The same truth applies to all knowledge 
which we possess and which rests upon individual 
experience. As all spirtiual knowledge rests upon 
individual experience, the foregoing declaration 
must apply to all spiritual truths. Every positive 
state or condition presupposes a negative or opposite 
state or condition. Every positive and fixed relation 
in life presupposes a negative or opposite relation. 
Life and all that life contains is measured by one 
common unit of measurement. That unit of meas- 
urement constitutes the difference between the 
positive and the negative of all that appertains to 
life, as determined by the individual experience of 
the soul. To know good the soul must first know 
evil, and it measures its own goodness and the joy 
it experiences therefrom by its degree of removal 
from the evil and the sorrow which it brought, 
according to its former experience. Is this saying 
that every soul must sin before it can enter heaven? 
It is not, but it is saying that every soul must either 
experience in itself the bitterness of sin, or the 
negative condition of that intermediate state into 
which it was born, before it can be conscious of the 
positive state of obedience and heaven. Heaven is 
more to the redeemed sinner than it can ever be to 



14 THE BOOK OF JOB 

the soul which never knew sin positively through 
actual transgression, but only negatively through 
its existence in the intermediate state. Unrepented 
sin damns the soul forever. Repented and pardoned 
sin intensifies the joys of the soul in heaven forever, 
because its unit of measurement based upon its 
individual experience, and by which it measures 
its own joy, embraces more degrees of difference 
between its two states, than can that of the other 
soul. Sin is therefore both a blessing and a curse; 
a blessing to the repentant and forgiven sinner, a 
curse to all who fail to repent. Job was led through 
the depths of mental and physical suffering in 
order that he might rise to otherwise unattainable 
heights of joy. 

If these declarations are truth, then why do not 
all suffer even as Job suffered? Why do not all 
sin and sin outrageously? The answer to both these 
questions is this: God's will and purpose assigns 
to each soul a definite and fixed course throughout 
both time and eternity. The soul is powerless to vary 
from that course by even a hairsbreadth, and yet 
its every thought and word and act is free, abso- 
lutely free. That divine purpose requires the life of 
every soul that is born on earth, some to attain the 
highest possible joy, some to suffer the greatest pos- 
sible sorrow, but in no case can the joy or the sorrow 
be without or beyond that infinite purpose. Such 
infinite purpose is formed in infinite love, governed 
by infinite power, and limited by infinite wisdom. 
It concerns the ultimate and everlasting happiness 
of all God's creatures, both human and super-human, 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 15 

both now in existence and hereafter to be created. 
Shall we, as nnits in an eternity of manifested life, 
question the power that brought us into being and 
purposed that we should suffer or enjoy? Let us 
rather thank God for what we suffer and for what 
we enjoy, knowing that infinite love compels it all. 



CHAPTER II. 

THE GIFT OF LIFE. 

Should man ever condemn his Creator for the 
gift of life? It would seem that if this could ever 
be proper it would have been justifiable on the part 
of the allegorical personage, Job. The lesson taught 
is that it is never justifiable. Job is represented as 
a human creature living to fulfill a divine purpose, 
suffering all that humanity can suffer, and himself 
regretting that to him had been given life in its 
human state. The lament of Job recognizes and 
reveals the truth which we have before declared, that 
the only possible entrance into spiritual existence is 
through human existence, but such human existence 
may be of the shortest duration and wholly uncon- 
scious. Job would have died at human birth and 
would have entered into spiritual existence through 
the door of human death. Job does not reproach 
God for bestowing upon him existence, but only for 
giving to him the human phase of existence beyond 
that necessary to usher him into the spiritual phase 
of it. 

This requires us to take up the truths of life, 
death, and the after-life, as these are presented by 
Job and to declare the revelation which is thus 
declared through him. This we will attempt to do 
under the following heads: 

1st. What is life? 

2nd. How is it bestowed upon the human race? 

16 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 17 

3rd. That which is inseparably connected with 
human life. 

4th. What is death? 

5th. That which is inseparably connected with 
death. 

Many thoughts which will follow under these 
several heads must necessarily be a repetition of 
what has been before presented, but our object is to 
present them together and in their proper order. 

1st. What is life? To answer this question 
clearly and fully is an impossibility, just as impos- 
sible as it would be to answer the question, What 
is God? Life is a manifestation of God. Life is a 
revelation of God. Life is from God. Life is of 
God a part. 

This is true of all life from that of the highest 
created intelligence to that of the lowest form of 
manifested life. All created life is of God, but all 
created life is not all of God. God's life is above 
and beyond all created life. The latter is simply a 
part of, a manifestation of, the eternal life which 
is God. Beyond this we cannot go in seeking an 
answer to the question, What is life? Beyond this 
human intelligence cannot go either in its present 
existence or in that existence which follows and is 
everlasting. The mystery of life is unsolved and is 
unsolvable. It is the mystery of the manifested life 
of God. 

2nd. Of how it is bestowed upon the human 
race we may know something, but that something 
is very little. We may know that human life is of 
the will of God and is not of the will of man, save 



18 THE BOOK OF JOB 

as the will of man becomes and is the will of God. 
Human life lies beyond the limit of all the powers 
of human beings, just as do all other forms of mani- 
fested life. All the powers of all the living united 
cannot produce the life of one plant, one tree ; cannot 
produce the life of one living animal form. We 
may know that it is in obedience to an unknown 
law of life that life is perpetuated. The law itself 
is past finding out. It belongs to the mysteries of 
the Infinite, the unknowable to human intelligence. 
Human agencies enter into and become a part of 
that law, but how or why this is true we even do 
not know. Human life has been created without 
the aid of any human agency. This is self evident, 
for otherwise there could have been no beginning 
of a human race. Human life has been created 
without the aid of the ordinary human agency, for 
otherwise the life of Jesus Christ could not have 
been more than human. The lift of Jesus Christ 
was both human and divine, human as to maternity, 
divine as to paternity, for it is in this sense alone 
that his life, his mere existence, is any other or 
greater revelation to man of the Father's life than is 
the life of every individual human creature. Christ 
reveals God to man in a double significance of that 
phrase : First, by his existence upon the earth as one 
born of woman, but not born of man, he reveals the 
existence of God as the author of all life. This is 
the same kind of revelation of this truth as we have 
through the creation and existence of the first crea- 
ture of the human race, typified as Adam, and the 
first helpmeet to that race, typified as Eve. We say 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 19 

of Eve, helpmeet to that race, because while woman 
was linked to and became a part of that race, she 
is the higher, the purer, the nobler part thereof. 
The human race is duplex, both in creation and in 
character. The two parts are inseparably allied as 
male and female, they are also unalterably separated 
and removed the one from the other, as male and 
female. The character of man is not the character 
of woman, and the character of woman is not the 
character of man. They occupy two separate and 
distinct planes in the order of manifested life, and 
no effort of man or of woman can ever change this 
decree of God. 

Whether woman be thus recognized as a separate 
and distinct creation with a separate and distinct 
character from the creation and the character rep- 
resented by the first man, Adam, or not, we have 
in these creations three instances wherein the law of 
life as commonly recognized and known to us has 
been varied. This simply establishes the truth that 
we do not know the law; we only know a part of 
the law. From the foregoing we may reasonably 
draw this conclusion: In creating human life God 
uses a law unknown to us except in part. Under 
this law life and one phase of human character 
were bestowed upon the first man of the human race, 
allegorically called Adam; under this same law life 
and another phase of human character were 
bestowed upon the first woman of the human race, 
allegorically called Eve; and under the same un- 
known law human life and the divine character were 
bestowed upon another, whose new existence was thus 



20 THE BOOK OF JOB 

created human. This is what God has revealed to 
us as to how life is bestowed upon those who possess 
human character in its lowest, its higher and its 
perfect expression. 

3rd. We have thus seen how life is bestowed. 
Let us next consider which is inseparably connected 
with life. In doing this we will consider the follow- 
ing as essential elements of human life and which 
must appear in every life in order that it be classed 
as human. 

First. It must have faculties and power which 
render it capable of knowing its Creator. Life not 
possessing these is not human, but is sub-human. 

Second. It must have the power of independent 
reasoning. 

Third. It must have the power of imagination. 

Fourth. It must have the power of development, 
without limitation upon that power. 

Fifth. It must have those minor faculties which 
adapt it to existence in a physical world and render 
it possible for it to be happy and contented therein. 

First. All human beings may know their Creator. 
No sub-human creature can know its Creator. Human 
life is the lowest expression of life to which such 
knowledge is possible. This is what constitutes it 
human. It is not reason which distinguishes man 
from the brute, for reason is neither more nor less 
than expanded or developed instinct, which is so 
bountifully bestowed upon the brute creation. Reason 
is given to man for his use in his physical environ- 
ment, and is of little value to him thereafter. While 
reason will not perish in the spiritual existence, its 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 21 

use therein must be necessarily limited. The earthly 
life of the soul is the period of the greatest activity 
and of the highest development of the power of 
reason, for it is the period in which that power can 
serve the soul in largest measure. Reason never 
revealed God to any human creature, and never can. 
Therefore when the earth-life of the soul is ended 
the purposes for which reason was bestowed upon it 
have been in the main fulfilled. Development in the 
knowledge of God the Father is the work of all 
spiritual existence, and in this work reason has no 
part. Such knowledge can come to the soul alone 
through its spiritual powers of worship and obedi- 
ence, as we have heretofore explained. The same is 
true of all those faculties and powers of the soul 
which adapt it to the enjoyment of its physical state 
of existence. They all either perish as wholly phys- 
ical in their nature and use or become subservient 
and unused powers if spiritual in their nature. 
Whatever is adapted to the soul's happiness and 
contentment in its spiritual existence remains unto 
it and is freely used by it. All else perishes, either 
because it is wholly physical in its nature and cannot 
be used, or because it is not so essential and is unused. 
An unused power perishes from non-use. This is a 
law which is revealed through nature in this world. 
Second. While all this is true of the power of 
reason, yet reason is necessary to render life human. 
Man without reason could not maintain a physical 
existence, could not conquer or subdue nature, could 
not discover the forces, laws and powers of the 
physical creation and subject them to his use. It 



22 THE BOOK OF JOB 

is reason that makes human life on earth possible, 
and that makes development during human life also 
possible. Reason is the master power of the human 
soul while its existence remains human. It is the 
earthly sovereign of all the powers which the soul 
possesses in its human state, but its reign ends with 
human death. Thereafter it becomes one of the soul's 
lowliest of remaining powers, itself subject to those 
which are wholly spiritual. 

Third. The soul in human life must have the 
power of imagination. Without this power it could 
develop none of its spiritual powers, could resist 
none of its human inclinations, would be powerless 
against temptation, would be unhuman in all its 
developments. Imagination is the most powerful aid 
in human life to correct and upright living, and to 
the faithful discharge of human duties and responsi- 
bilities. What is that which we thus call imagina- 
tion? It is the power of the soul to contemplate 
facts and relations which do not exist, but which 
might exist, and to deduce conclusions therefrom, 
the same as if they actually did exist. Such con- 
clusions thus deduced are the guide and the support 
of the soul throughout its earthly existence. Imag- 
ination is denied to all life sub-human. It is insep- 
arable from all life which carries with it moral 
obligations and moral responsibilities. Therefore 
imagination can never cease as an active power of 
the soul. 

Fourth. Human life must also have the power 
of development, and that power must be without 
limitation. This does not mean that such power must 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 23 

be infinite, for infinity does not apply to anything 
created. Infinity cannot be attained by any power 
which is itself created, but within infinity there can 
be no bounds set to the development of any power 
bestowed upon a life created morally responsible. 
Such limitation would be inconsistent with the 
bestowal of the power. Individual effort is made 
the measure of individual development, and this will 
be ever true. 

Fifth. It must have those minor faculties which 
adapt it to its existence in a physical world and 
render it possible for it to be happy and contented 
therein. This the infinite love of the Creator necessi- 
tates in every form of life which is created, and this 
truth is revealed through all life created. Life with- 
out such faculties would in itself deny the attribute 
of infinite love. To deny this is to deny God. Life 
is in itself the fullest and the clearest revelation of 
God's existence which the world contains. As we 
advance in spiritual understanding this truth will 
be forced upon us all. We may not accept it in this 
world, but will be forced to accept it in the world 
to come. Life anywhere which is unbearable is an 
impossibility. Life which is a burden is an impos- 
sibility anywhere, except such burden be self- 
imposed. This is true of life in hell. It is not true 
of any other state or condition of life either among 
intelligent or non-intelligent creatures in so far as 
knowledge is given us. We therefore have to deal 
only with the happiness which God has created, and 
not with the sorrows which man has imposed upon 
himself. We will therefore treat of life as wholly 



24 THE BOOK OF JOB 

contented, wholly happy. In order that life should 
be wholly contented, wholly happy, it must be 
endowed with faculties perfectly adapting it to the 
environment and the capacity bestowed upon it. 
This is true of all life as it was originally created. 
It remains true of all life which is below intelligent 
existence. It remains true of all human life except 
where it has been modified by our own acts or the 
acts of those through whom life has been bestowed 
upon us. Barring inherited conditions, we are each 
born with faculties perfectly adapting us to our 
environment and our capacity. We have the power 
to satisfy every desire and every longing which 
belongs to our human existence. Perfect happiness 
is neither more nor less than such satisfaction. If, 
therefore, we are not perfectly happy and contented 
it is because of our own acts or of inherited condi- 
tions. How, then, are we to account for human 
unhappiness, and for endless and hopeless sorrow in 
hell? Unhappiness rests upon human error. Sorrow 
in hell rests upon purposed disobedience. The human 
error may be our own or it may be of those who 
have preceded us. We have the power to guard 
against both, therefore we have it in our power to 
be perfectly happy. We have the power to obey 
and we have the power to disobey; therefore if we 
choose disobedience the sorrows of hell come through 
our own act. It is impossible that we should possess 
intelligence and should be contented and happy, 
without possessing the power to follow our own wills. 
This power goes with and belongs to intelligent 
existence everywhere. The two are inseparable. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 25 

Neither can exist without the other, and God be God. 
This is not all that life must be in order that it be 
human, but life must be all that we have described 
in order that it be human. 

4th. What is death? We have answered this 
inquiry so fully in previous pages that it is unneces- 
sary to say more here. Death is the absence of 
manifested life. It is not extinction; it is oblivion. 
There can be no extinction of anything that is cre- 
ated. There can be change of material form, but not 
extinction of material substance. That which God 
has created is everlasting, as is its Creator. This is 
not only true of the soul and of its spiritual powers, 
but it is true of the soul and its physical powers. 
It is not only true of the soul; it is true of its 
physical body as well. It is not only true of the 
human body ; it is true of all material substance, of all 
material worlds. Nothing, absolutely nothing, can 
ever be extinguished. Death, therefore, when applied 
to material substance, means and can only mean 
change of form. Death when applied to the soul's 
faculties and powers means and can only mean the 
loss of the power to use. The term death can never 
be applied to the soul itself, for it is deathless. The 
loss of the power to use is oblivion; it is not death. 

5th. We next consider that which is inseparably 
connected with death. In doing this we subdivide 
the theme thus : 

First. The death of the body. 

Second. The death of the soul's physical powers. 

Third. The death of the soul's spiritual powers. 



26 THE BOOK OF JOB 

Fourth. The state of oblivion. 

First. What is the death of the body? It is 
the dissolution of the body and the soul. They exist 
together; they use each other; then they cease to 
exist together and to use each other. Such ceasing 
is called death. The body, no longer sustained by 
the soul, decomposes— that is to say, is resolved back 
into the simpler elements of nature. It again becomes 
unorganized matter; what we might describe as 
ashes, or earth, and gases. The body was built up 
from these elements; it has gone back unto these 
elements; and this is all that there is of death when 
the term is applied to the body. The period of its 
use by the soul has passed, never to be resumed 
again, for the reason that the soul will never again 
take on a material existence. A higher form of life 
never descends into a lower form of existence. Life 
may descend into a lower state of existence, but not 
into a lower form. We speak of created life, not of 
uncreated life. Created life begins with the lowest 
possible form in which it can be manifested and 
ascends into such higher form as may be possible to 
it. It never descends in the form through which it 
expresses itself. Uncreated life is not governed by 
such law. It might be expressed though any form 
of existence and be divinely perfect wherever ex- 
pressed. It was thus with Christ, who in his human 
existence expressed uncreated life, divinely perfect. 
Death, therefore, when applied to the body, means 
everlasting dissolution and the everlasting reversion 
of the body to the simpler elements of the material 
world. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 27 

Second. We will next consider the death of the 
soul's physical powers. Such powers of the soul can 
only act through the soul's physical organization, the 
body. The body ceasing forever to exist as such, all 
the powers of the soul requiring the physical organ- 
ization for their manifestation and use, must forever 
cease to be manifested or used. The power itself 
does not cease to exist in the sense of being oblit- 
erated or destroyed, but it passes into oblivion 
through lack of ability or opportunity to use it. This 
and nothing but this constitutes the death of the 
soul's physical powers. 

Third. The same is true of the soul's spiritual 
powers. They cease to be used, if lost or dead, 
because the power to use them has been taken from 
the soul. If this happens it results as an effect of 
the soul's own act, and not because of the laws which 
govern its existence, as does human death. All of 
this has been heretofore fully dwelt upon. 

Fourth. What, then, is oblivion, into which 
these cast-off powers of the human soul pass? It is 
a state of non-use; a state of inactivity; a state of 
rest as distinguished from activity. It is not a state 
of death in the sense that if the opportunity for use 
was again presented the power itself would not be 
there and would not again spring into activity and 
use, but it is death in the sense that such power never 
will be again called into use. Oblivion is the state 
of all spiritual powers destroyed by the soul's own 
act. It is the state of all the physical powers de- 



28 THE BOOK OF JOB 

stroyed by the death of the body. It is the state of 
all created life which is dependent upon a material 
existence for its manifestation, after such material 
existence ceases. 



CHAPTER III. 

ELIPHAZ, JOB'S FIRST FRIEND. — THE NECESSITY FOR 
SUFFERING AND THE EFFECTS OF SUFFERING. 

Eliphaz symbolizes the soul's belief in its God. 
Such is the friend who comes to all as he came to 
Job. "What does this friend teach whenever and 
wherever he comes? Submission to God's will; 
obedience to God's command; love towards our 
Creator. Let suffering come to the human soul, and 
this friend comes as surely as comes the suffering. 
He pleads the cause of God whose divine purpose 
permits human suffering, necessitates human suffer- 
ing, and uses human suffering for his own ends. 
What, then, shall we say of human suffering? We 
will treat the subject at length and under the follow- 
ing heads: 

1st. The necessity which exists for human suf- 
fering. 

2nd. The benefits accruing from human suffer- 
ing. 

3rd. The possibility that suffering may never 
cease throughout the life of the soul in heaven. 

By human suffering we mean physical, mental 
and spiritual suffering. They are all the outgrowth 
of the same necessity and serve the same purpose. 
We shall therefore treat of all three under one and 
the same argument. 



30 THE BOOK OF JOB 

1st. That a necessity exists for suffering, its 
very existence proves. God permits nothing to exist 
for which there is not a necessity. Infinite power 
is never exerted without the existence of a necessity 
for its exertion. The necessity for suffering exists 
because of God's infinite purpose concerning the 
lives and the happiness of all created intelligent 
beings. That purpose is beyond the comprehension 
of all finite powers, but that such purpose exists has 
been declared by the revelation of God's infinite 
attributes. The acceptance of the truth of such 
existing attributes necessitates the acceptance of the 
truth of the existence of such divine and infinite 
purpose. It also necessitates the acceptance of the 
truth that such purpose concerns the happiness of 
the greatest possible number of all created intelli- 
gences, both human and super-human. There can 
be no anger, no revenge, no punishment known to 
God's revealed and infinite attributes. Either is 
inconsistent with the existence of these attributes. 
The law of necessity is the law which governs God's 
universe. The law of cause and effect— that is, of 
effect following cause— is but one degree below it in 
universality of application and in the production of 
results. These two laws must be relied upon to har- 
monize all suffering with the attributes of infinite 
power, infinite wisdom and infinite love. When 
rightly considered and correctly understood, these 
two laws will do this, and this is the object of the 
present argument. 

First, then, as to the necessity for human suffer- 
ing. As we have just said, the fact that human 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 31 

suffering exists, compels the acceptance of the truth 
that a necessity for it also exists, by all who receive 
and accept the revelation of the existence of God's 
three infinite attributes, infinite power, infinite wis- 
dom and infinite love. These three infinite attributes 
cannot co-exist under the control of one will, and 
human suffering likewise exist, without a necessity 
therefor. We take it for granted that those who have 
followed our thoughts thus far are only such as have 
received and accepted the revelation of the existence 
of these three infinite attributes, hence we will not 
here enter into any review of such revelation. God 
is revealed to man from the beginning of revelation 
as Almighty. Through Moses he was revealed as 
Jehovah, and through Christ as Redeemer and 
Saviour; infinite in power, infinite in wisdom, and 
infinite in love ; three infinite powers directed by one 
will. Trinity in unity, the simplest and yet the high- 
est and the plainest conception of a triune God-Head 
that the mind of man can conceive. Christ never 
caused men to suffer. He did not go about producing 
sickness, disease, pain, agony of mind, or sorrow of 
soul. No follower of his can think of him as any 
other than the very opposite of this, and Christ is 
in himself the revelation of this attribute of infinite 
love. Hence if we accept Christ and the revelation 
which he embodies we must think of God whom he 
reveals, by the same thoughts which we have of 
Christ, the loving, pitying, helping, saving Redeemer. 
Christ did not destroy all the pain, sorrow and 
anguish by which he was surrounded, not even in 
those who were nearest, and by earthly ties alone, 



32 THE BOOK OF JOB 

dearest, to him of all mankind, because he was him- 
self obedient to all the attributes of the God whom 
he revealed. The law of necessity and the law of 
cause and effect governed Christ upon the earth as 
they govern God the Father, always. Suffering is 
therefore a part of the infinite purpose of God con- 
cerning all his intelligent creatures. We have no 
right to say that that infinite purpose limits suffering 
to the human race, or to the short span of the earthly 
existence of the human soul. God has not revealed 
such to be the truth, and he has revealed the opposite 
to be the truth when we rightly comprehend such 
revelation. If suffering is a necessity in human life 
it is because of some law which governs the existence 
of such necessity. God's laws are universal in their 
application. No law of God exists which is applicable 
to the human race alone, or to angelic beings alone. 
All laws are applicable to all creatures under like 
conditions. Conditions alone can vary the applica- 
tion of the law. They do not vary the law itself, they 
only vary the application of it. The law exists 
eternal as the God of whom it is a part. 

With the foregoing clearly in mind, let us now 
seek to find the necessity which compels human suf- 
fering. To find a cause we must study its effect. 
If we can correctly understand the effect, we can 
from such understanding assign the cause, just as 
certainly as that we can predict the effect of a cause 
which we understand. We do both because of the 
constancy and the universality of the law of cause 
and effect, which we will now call the second law 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 33 

of nature, the law of necessity being the first and 
the greatest. 

"We must, then, analyze carefully the effect of 
human suffering. This we will do under the follow- 
ing subdivisions : 

First. Its effect upon the physical existence of 
the sufferer. 

Second. Its effect upon the spiritual existence of 
the sufferer. 

Third. Its effect upon the physical and the spir- 
itual lives of others. 

Under these three heads we must get all from it 
that we can possibly know. Under the head of the 
physical effect upon the life of the sufferer we must 
also consider the effect of idleness, of labor and of 
luxury. 

Man becomes that which he makes of himself, but 
in the making of himself he is not wholly free. He 
is free as to his will, but he is not free as to his 
environment. Freedom of will is his by the gift of 
life. Environment is of divine purpose. "We cannot 
govern the environment into which we are born, but 
that environment is certain to govern us in a greater 
or less degree. This certainty God foreknows and 
uses in giving us life. Each member of the human 
race, therefore, begins his existence, with the gift of 
human life, direct from God his Creator. Such life, 
being human, must embody and contain all that is 
common to human life, all that constitutes it human, 
all that distinguishes it from other orders of life. In 
addition thereto this gift of life carries with it trends 



34 THE BOOK OF JOB 

of individual character, which we will call individual 
characteristics, which are bestowed through heredity. 
It also carries with it environment, physical, social, 
intellectual and spiritual. None of these destroy the 
freedom of the individual will. It has the power 
to ignore, control, and rise above them all, but they 
do influence that will, and do influence it strongly. 
Man makes himself what he becomes, but in that 
making God's leadings are ever present and man 
becomes that which God purposed he should become. 
This, man does by the exercise of his own free will, 
untrammeled and unhampered, save by inherited 
characteristics and environment. For these the indi- 
vidual is not responsible, God bestowed them. The 
individual is responsible for any willful disobedience 
of any law of God, of which law he has knowledge in 
his heart, and such responsibility is neither lessened 
nor enlarged by reason of either the inherited char- 
acteristics or the bestowed environment. Willful 
disobedience is the measure and the only measure of 
all sin. 

In each individual human life, therefore, we find 
the following conditions and responsibilities. Life 
came to us as a gift from God direct. That gift 
brought to us all that is common to the life which 
is human, and it also brought to us inherited char- 
acteristics which are individual, and an environment 
which is distinctive. From these we are to build 
up individual character, individual results, individ- 
ual destiny. If from this point God withheld from 
us all influences guiding or leading us in such devel- 
opment, would it be consistent with the attribute of 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 35 

infinite love? Would it reveal to us infinite justice, 
which is a part thereof? To me it would not. It 
therefore follows that God must follow us throughout 
our earthly lives with other influences which either 
aid or hinder us in the one great trial and test and 
purpose of our existence, the choice of obedience or 
of disobedience to the laws of our Creator. Such 
influences are thus shown to be a necessity to our 
creation. What are the influences thus used by our 
Creator? They are physical suffering, mental agony, 
spiritual sorrow; they are prosperity and its oppo- 
site, poverty, in all their varying degrees; they are 
labor and idle luxurious ease, in all their varied 
forms; they are evil associations and influences and 
good associations and influences in all their shades 
and degrees ; they are all things that tend to weaken 
and all things that tend to strengthen the will of the 
individual soul. Under all these influences, great 
and small, the will of the soul acts and fixes its ever- 
lasting destiny, and in such choice infinite wisdom 
and infinite love have made it no harder and yet no 
easier for one soul to will and choose obedience than 
it is for every other soul created to make the same 
choice. Among all such influences brought to bear 
upon the individual soul there are none more potent 
than those which arise from physical suffering, 
mental agony and spiritual sorrow. This we will all 
recognize more or less clearly as the thought is pre- 
sented. Human suffering is one thing to one soul, 
another thing to another soul. No two souls created 
have been affected by it in precisely the same manner 
or to precisely the same extent. Infinite wisdom has 



36 THE BOOK OF JOB 

adjusted human suffering to each individual being 
so that he should derive therefrom just what is 
required to make him equal with all other human 
beings in his final choice between obedience and dis- 
obedience. When we shall have accepted this truth, 
then will we bear suffering with patience and with 
resignation, thanking God for the gift of life with 
suffering, as we now thank him for the gift of life 
without suffering. Suffering is the equalizer of the 
goodness and the mercy and the love of God to all 
souls. It is the revelation of infinite wisdom as to 
what is required in each individual case in order to 
do this, and it is the revelation of infinite love, in 
that God thus equalizes the chances and the powers 
of all in the making of that one choice which is the 
object and the end of the gift of life. God creates 
all intelligent beings for the sole purpose that they 
might choose between obedience and disobedience to 
all of his revealed laws, in order that they might 
become like unto himself in their several states of 
life and according to their several degrees of under- 
standing, or that he might be hidden from them in 
the oblivion of a spiritual death, through which they 
still fulfill his infinite purpose and meet the neces- 
sity for their creation. Suffering is the most power- 
ful influence which God brings to bear upon the 
human race. Its effect is so direct, so powerful, and 
so clearly defined that they who suffer and have been 
influenced by it cannot fail to recognize either the 
benign or the detrimental effects which have arisen 
from it in their own individual cases. If you have 
recognized these effects as beneficial to yourself, then 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 37 

you can and do thank God for imposing the suffering 
upon you. If you cannot recognize beneficent effects, 
but can recognize detrimental effects, then you may 
not be able to thank God for imposing the suffering, 
but should be able to accept the truth that it is 
imposed by infinite love, and that it but equalizes you 
with all others in meeting that one great trial and 
test for which life was given you. 

Second. This leads us to consider the effect of 
suffering upon the spiritual life of the sufferer. If 
suffering aids the soul in its human existence in that 
choice which is the object and the purpose of its 
creation, is it not reasonable that it should also aid 
the soul in its spiritual existence, in remaining 
steadfast to such choice? If God bestowed upon his 
human creatures one common character with indi- 
vidual characteristics and varying environment, 
which, remaining unequalized, would render it harder 
for one soul than for another to choose obedience, 
then the continuing effect of such characteristics 
and the continuing effect of such environment would 
make it harder in its spiritual existence for one soul 
to remain steadfast to such choice than for another 
soul, unless such inequality was equalized by con- 
tinuing influences. This makes sorrow in heaven 
possible. This makes it certain that something cor- 
responding in effect with the effect of human suffer- 
ing in earth does exist in heaven. That something 
can be nothing more nor less than spiritual sorrow, 
spiritual suffering, whatever we may understand by 
these terms. It is impossible that the soul of man 
should ever escape the guiding and equalizing influ- 



38 THE BOOK OF JOB 

ences of its Creator's infinite love, his infinite justice. 
We accept the truth that the soul's individual char- 
acteristics are as variable as are the number of souls 
created ; that these influence us in our thoughts, our 
purposes and our will, here upon earth. It appears 
self-evident that they will continue to influence us 
in our spiritual existence. If this be true, then these 
effects of inherited characteristics and bestowed 
environment must be equalized in some manner in 
our spiritual existence, otherwise they would cease to 
reveal infinite love, infinite justice. In earth I assert 
that this is done by physical suffering, mental 
anguish and spiritual sorrow. Physical suffering 
cannot follow the soul into its spiritual existence; 
the other two may go with it and remain with it 
therein. To my mind and understanding, this they 
certainly do. How, then, about suffering in hell? 
That will be considered at another time and in 
another connection. 

Third. We do not suffer alone, neither are the 
effects of our suffering limited to our own lives. 
Human love, human sympathy and human hatred 
are so powerful that they draw to themselves much 
of the effect of human suffering. We have all felt 
its effect directly and powerfully. In such cases 
was the suffering laid upon the individuals who 
endured it for their own good or for ours? That 
question can only be answered in one way. It was 
imposed upon the individual for all the effects which 
resulted from it, whether those effects were upon the 
individual suffering or upon others; whether such 
effects were present and apparently transient, or 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 39 

whether their influences promise to extend and 
broaden throughout the endless existence of the soul. 
We, then, suffer, not alone for our own good, but also 
for the good of others, maybe solely for the good of 
others, as were the sufferings of Christ our Saviour. 
Is it a strange thought to us that we may be called 
upon to suffer for the good of others? If it is, let 
us familiarize ourselves with the thought and learn 
to know it as a truth, for it is a truth, revealed by the 
life and the sufferings of Christ our Redeemer. Not 
that we suffer upon the same plane, or for the same 
purpose that Christ suffered, but that we do suffer 
under the same law which necessitated his suffering. 
Vicarious suffering! What is the meaning of it? 
It is that suffering which we are all called upon to 
endure for others, in some form or manner. It is 
based upon the principle of the unity of all created 
intelligences, of every order from the highest to the 
lowest. That one should suffer for the good of all 
is infinite justice, and infinite justice requires this. 
If each suffered for his own good alone, then it would 
be necessary that all should suffer, or that none 
should suffer. We have asserted and tried to show 
that suffering exists because of a necessity that it 
should exist. Is it a necessity that all should suffer? 
It is not. Many, very many, may escape suffering 
themselves, but none can escape the effect of suffer- 
ing. Such effect is a necessity for all, and is experi- 
enced by all, but all need not suffer in order that 
this be true. In this truth we find the solution of 
the mystery of the imposition of suffering upon the 
few, and the escape of the many therefrom. Infinite 



40 THE BOOK OF JOB 

love forbids the imposition of suffering upon one 
more soul than is required by the necessity of the 
law imposing suffering upon some. Is there, then, a 
law necessitating suffering and necessitating the 
imposition of it upon the few? A belief in the 
infinite attributes of God must answer this question 
affirmatively and must so answer it without a doubt 
remaining in the mind of the believer, as to the truth 
of that answer. Every cry that is wrung from the 
soul of man, either by physical pain, mental anguish 
or spiritual sorrow, comes because of a necessity 
compelling it, whether the effect thereof be upon the 
one who suffers or upon others who do not suffer. 
Sometimes we may almost read this law and the 
necessity for its existence in the very surroundings 
and effects of the individual cases of suffering which 
come within our observation, and of which we our- 
selves feel some effect. A ship goes down, supposedly 
by the act of man. Two hundred and sixty-six souls 
rush through death into eternity, suffering loss of 
human life and human opportunities. Was it for 
anything that they themselves had done that this 
came upon them ? No one dare say, Yes. Then what 
was the necessity therefor? That a new nation 
should be born into the family of nations ; that a peo- 
ple should be made free ; that one civilization should 
be destroyed and another established; that a nation 
should be aroused to new duties, new responsibilities 
and a new destiny; that new methods should follow 
old methods, new government follow old government, 
even at the antipodes of the earth. All this we in our 
day have seen. By this God has shown to us who 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 41 

can read his message that we do not live for our- 
selves alone, neither do we suffer and die because of 
what we ourselves have done, but that we live, we 
suffer, we die, to fulfill God's infinite purpose. 

As it is with nations and peoples, so is it with 
individuals. My own life has revealed this to me; 
yours may have revealed it to you. 

Suffering is therefore a necessity, imposed upon 
some for the good of all. We do not all suffer, but 
we all bear the record of the influence of suffering 
upon our individual destinies. I am what I am be- 
cause others have suffered to the end that I might 
become what I am. I have myself suffered to the 
end that others might become what they now are. 
I realize that I could not have become what I am if 
others had not suffered for me, and I realize that I 
may yet be called upon to suffer in order that others 
may become what God's infinite purpose necessitates 
that they shall become. This is vicarious suffering, 
and the law which necessitates and governs it is the 
same law which necessitated and governed the 
vicarious sufferings of Jesus Christ. It is not the 
suffering of Christ, nor the death of Christ, which 
pardons sin. It is the revelation of God through 
Christ which giveth spiritual life to the soul of man, 
and which constitutes the new birth of the soul. 
Neither his suffering, nor his blood, nor his death, 
availeth to do this where such revelation is lacking. 
If such revelation could have come to man, without 
the suffering, without the shedding of blood, without 
the death, Christ would not have passed through the 
agonies endured by him. These were a necessity to 



42 THE BOOK OF JOB 

attract all men to him through the God-given power 
of sympathy, and thus lead them to an acceptance of 
the revelation. The revelation and the acceptance of 
that revelation are the potent factors in the salvation 
of the soul. All else are but aids to these. 

2nd. We now take up the second subdivision of 
this theme, to wit, the benefits accruing from human 
suffering. If it be true that infinite justice necessi- 
tates that individual influences be brought to bear 
upon the souls of men in order that it should be 
equally easy and equally difficult for each to choose 
between obedience and disobedience to the commands 
of God, and that human suffering is the medium 
through which such influences are brought to bear 
upon the human soul, then we have a sufficient cause 
for, and a rational explanation of, individual human 
suffering. 

Add to such influences those which are national 
or world-wide in their effects, although individual in 
the manner of their production, and we have a suf- 
ficient cause for, and a rational explanation of, all 
human suffering, whether it be individual or col- 
lective. This we assert to be the truth. God with 
his infinite attributes does not permit the existence 
of any human suffering, whether it be individual or 
collective, without the existence of a necessity there- 
for, without a purpose to be fulfilled thereby, and 
without the manifestation of infinite justice displayed 
therein. Such suffering does not and cannot exist 
without meeting such necessity, without fulfilling such 
purpose, and without being productive of the great- 
est good to the largest number of his intelligent 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 43 

creatures. If I can establish this assertion of truth 
to the satisfaction of one human sufferer, then I 
shall have rendered a true service to mankind. If 
I can do this for many then by the ratio of such 
number shall this service be multiplied. In seek- 
ing to do this I lay down one broad proposition 
which must be first accepted and believed. It is: 
The measure of good to all created intelligent be- 
ings must govern in the infliction and distribution 
of human suffering. The individual must sink him- 
self in the great aggregate of created intelligences, 
and must in this life accept suffering, whether phys- 
ical or mental or spiritual, without the thought that 
r,n individual and personal error or sin has brought 
it upon him, and without the thought that it is for 
his own good alone that he suffers. Human suffer- 
ing is neither more nor less than human altruism, 
forced upon the race unknowingly and unwillingly, 
nevertheless, human altruism. It is upon this broad 
ground alone, that the mind of man can conceive 
of both the necessity and the infinite justice em- 
bodied in the fact of physical suffering, mental an- 
guish and spiritual sorrow. 

In order to accept these truths we must go one 
step deeper into the mysteries of the creation of 
intelligent beings. Life is given to no intelligent 
creature for his own good and for his own pos- 
sible happiness. This would be a narrow view of 
creation and of that infinite purpose which preceded 
it. God's attributes are infinite in their applica- 
tion to all his creatures as an aggregate intelligent 
creation. They are not infinite when limited in 



44 THE BOOK OF JOB 

their application to any one individual of that crea- 
tion, except in the sense that that individual is a 
part of the aggregate whole. This means simply 
this: that one or many individuals according to God's 
wisdom and pleasure, must suffer and die, physically 
and spiritually, without cause other than that the 
good of the whole demands such suffering and death. 
The individual suffers and dies without cause or 
fault on his part as an individual. The cause lies 
in a necessity that is applicable to the whole. This 
is the broadest view that we are called upon to 
accept. There may be individual cause and in- 
dividual good connected with human suffering. The 
cause and the good may attach to those near and 
dear unto us, or to those wholly unknown to us and 
remote from us. In all cases the suffering has a 
cause, immediate or remote, and produces an effect 
immediate or remote when considered in relation to 
the sufferer. It therefore follows that all human suf- 
fering, whether it be physical pain, mental anguish, 
or spiritual sorrow, is necessitated by the require- 
ments of the individual sufferer, or by the require- 
ments of those near to him, or of those more re- 
mote from him, or by the requirements of the whole 
intelligent creation, and no such suffering is in vain. 
If no suffering exists except such as is required, and 
none is in vain, then good must come of all human 
suffering. Can we establish this as a truth? In 
order to do so let us consider the subject in the fol- 
lowing manner. 

First. What is the effect of human suffering up- 
on ourselves individually? 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 45 

Second. What is its effect upon others situated 
as we are? 

Third. What is its effect upon other differently 
connected with the sufferer? 

From these three views of human suffering we 
must draw our conclusions. 

First. As to ourselves, there is not one of us 
who has not experienced positive and marked effects 
from human suffering. It has drawn our hearts to 
the sufferer by a sympathetic love which is beyond 
description. Love is the most powerful incentive 
of the human character. It above all other things 
makes of the human character what it is and what 
it becomes. In making this assertion I may have 
gone beyond what would be the thought of many. 
I speak from what I feel and know within myself. 
I feel and know that I am but an individual of a 
race similarly endowed with myself. Love is both 
the inciting power and the governing power which 
rules the thoughts and the acts of mankind. What 
then is love? Has man ever denned it? Can man 
ever define it? Not unless man can express in 
words, a human power, a human passion, a human 
state; for love is a passion, a power, and a state. 
In its purity it may and does enwrap the world and 
rise to heaven. In its impurity it blights earth, 
bars the gates of heaven, and opens wide the por- 
tals of hell. A passion and a power which may be 
the holiest and may be the deadliest in its effects 
is worthy of more than a passing thought. Can 
we fathom the mysteries of love and that infinite 
wisdom which bestowed it as a passion and a power 



46 THE BOOK OF JOB 

upon the human race? We can in part, but in part 
only. To do this we must imagine what man would 
be without love. A monster of selfish hate, is the 
only figure that can come before our thoughts to 
thus represent man; a brute with intelligence, yea 
more than a brute, for brutes do love their own. A 
sordid selfish hating soul cannot be bestowed upon 
an intelligent creature and God be true to his own 
infinite attributes. Such, man would have been with- 
out the gift of love. Love is the revelation and the 
image of our God, written within our own being. 
None can escape this revelation of his Creator, for 
it is a common gift to all humanity. Such is love, 
controlled by purity of desire and purpose. Purity 
of desire and purpose may be likened to a fountain 
from which none but pure, sweet waters can ever flow, 
and we may drink of such waters as God has bestowed 
upon us the power. Beware lest impurity of de- 
sire and purpose enter into such fountain and em- 
bitter the waters thereof for thereafter there is 
spiritual death in the draught therefrom. Sin does 
not lie in the act committed, but in the desire and 
purpose to commit an act which would be disobe- 
dience. To drink of the sweet waters of this pure 
fountain leads the soul of man towards heaven just 
as to drink of the impure waters of this bitter foun- 
tain leads the soul towards hell. God therefore with 
infinite wisdom has bestowed upon man, in this 
power and passion of love, the highest possible in- 
centive to lead the soul towards heaven and into a 
knowledge of himself, conditioned only that it be 
used in obedience to his commands, and has given 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 47 

to all mankind the power and the understanding to 
thus use it. The power of love for good, when thus 
used is beyond human comprehension. No such 
mighty power for good when rightly directed can 
be bestowed without carrying with it the necessity 
of making it a correspondingly mighty power for 
evil when wrongly used. The power is the same in 
both cases, and must of necessity be the same. It 
is left to the choice of each individual to direct this 
power either as an aid to his own salvation and 
everlasting happiness, or as a force dragging him 
down to spiritual death and everlasting sorrow. 

Now, recognizing this as true of love and presum- 
ing that our love is wholly pure, I ask the question: 
Is there anything that can so stir this power and 
passion of love within us, as does human suffering? 
If we but analyze our own feelings aright we can- 
not but answer that there is not. Human suffering 
draws us in love to the one who suffers, by a power 
that is irresistible, whatever may be the relation- 
ship between us and the sufferer. It may even stir 
this power within an enemy's breast, and soften 
hearts debased and brought low through the power 
of an impure love. This thought is the key which 
unlocks the mystery of human suffering. It is the 
key which unlocks the mystery of the sufferings of 
Jesus Christ. Human suffering is a necessity to 
the salvation of the human race just as Christ's suf- 
ferings were a necessity to its redemption. 

Second. What is its effect upon others situated 
as we are ? We have traced the effect of human suf- 
fering upon ourselves as declared to us through our 



48 THE BOOK OF JOB 

own experience. It now remains to inquire into its 
effect upon others similarly situated and finally upon 
others dissimilarly situated to ourselves. In doing 
this we assume that human character is a constant 
factor, the same in all human beings, modified alone 
by individual characteristics. The fundamental ele- 
ments of human character upon which the preceding 
argument rests are common to all who possess hu- 
man character; therefore in so far as that argument 
is true, it applies equally to every human creature, 
as it does to ourselves individually. Human sym- 
pathy is an element of human character and there- 
fore it must be found in some degree, as an element 
of the character of every human being. It is con- 
stant and ever present although sometimes over- 
shadowed by other elements especially dominant or 
especially aroused. We may safely conclude there- 
fore that the effect of human suffering is always the 
same upon others similarly situated as ourselves, as 
it has been and is now upon us. The individual, the 
community, the state, the nation, the world are 
moved by one common impulse of sympathy, spring- 
ing from one common cause, to the limit that such 
cause extends. The effect of the cause is limited 
alone by the knowledge of the cause. I speak of one 
common and universal law. The effect is subject to 
such modifications as are produced by personal re- 
lationship, acquaintance, nationality, and aroused 
passions; but subject to these the law and the effect 
are ever present and constant in their manifestations. 
Third. Suffering by the brute creation produces 
the same effect in man as does human suffering. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 49 

It is only less marked in degree. This should be 
sufficient to reveal to us a universal law of sympathy 
extending from the highest creature to the lowest 
creature, capable of manifesting it. Man is certainly 
not such lowest creature, for brutes manifest this pow- 
er in marked degree. Even the brute may show sym- 
pathy for the suffering of man. If therefore such uni- 
versal law of sympathy prevails, it extends from angel 
to man, as it does from man to brute. It extends from 
man to angel as it does from brute to man. This I 
assert and believe to be the truth. Human suffer- 
ing has its effect upon angel, just as brute suffer- 
ing has its effect upon man. It is beyond the power 
of human intellect to measure the necessity which 
produced human suffering and all the effects that 
spring therefrom. We may only grasp the truth 
that there is such necessity and that there are such 
effects. We must leave the development of these 
truths to an eternity of progressive understanding. 
This much is sufficient to give us some insight into 
the necessity for human suffering and the benefits 
resulting therefrom. 

3rd. These thoughts lead up to the thought 
that suffering may never cease throughout the life 
of the soul in heaven. Repugnant as such thought 
may be to our preconceived thoughts of heaven, it 
must be considered and considered carefully. We 
have shown that the benefits accruing from human 
suffering are derived through and on account of 
that element of character which we call sympathy. 
We have also suggested (if not shown) that sym- 
pathy is an element of character common to all crea- 



50 THE BOOK OF JOB 

tures capable of manifesting it. No one admitting 
the existence of God will question the assertion that 
it is an element of his character, a part of the at- 
tribute of infinite love. The assertion then that sym- 
pathy as an element of character extends from 
God the Father, down through all orders of his 
creatures to the very lowest capable of manifesting 
it, can be made with confidence that it will be ac- 
cepted by the great majority. What is sympathy? 
It is altruistic love born of and sustained by suf- 
fering. I can give no fuller or more comprehensive 
definition of it than is contained in these few words. 
This is what I mean by sympathy; this is what I am 
thinking of and writing about. If to you sympathy 
means something else, then we are not thinking of 
the same thing. If therefore sympathy is born of 
and is sustained by suffering it cannot outlast or 
outlive suffering. If suffering ceases sympathy dies. 
God, without sympathy! Angelic creatures without 
sympathy! A human soul without sympathy! Can 
this ever become true? Never, while the character 
of God continues as it is revealed to us ; never, while 
angelic character remains angelic; never, while hu- 
man character remains human. Then when will suf- 
fering cease? Never, throughout eternity. Is there 
then suffering in heaven? The human soul is born 
to suffer and will ever suffer. It is born to meet 
the necessity that there should be suffering, and it 
will forever meet and fulfill that necessity. Suffer- 
ing will continue as long as the life which is now 
human, or ever has been human, continues, and 
through suffering shall this element of divine char- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 51 

acter be ever revealed to all intelligent creatures. 
But shall such suffering be in heaven as well as in 
hell? There can be but one answer to this ques- 
tion, and that is, Yes. Do the good, the pure, the 
righteous, suffer in earth? So shall they also suf- 
fer in heaven, for the laws of God are changeless 
and are everlasting. If a necessity exists that the 
good, the pure, the righteous, should suffer in earth, 
that same necessity will ever continue, and will ever 
cause the same suffering. Job was a perfect man, 
and Job suffered. Job was in the spiritual state of 
heaven when he suffered, for to the perfect heaven 
begins in earth, and is unchanged by human death. 
Heavenly suffering after death can contain nothing 
of the physical, but is limited to mental anguish 
and spiritual sorrow. What produces it? "What 
produced it in Job while he was in the heavenly 
state in earth life? The will of God, because of the 
necessity that it should exist. Death changes not 
the heavenly state of those who enter it in earth 
life, save to eliminate the physical from their exist- 
ence. All else remain the same even to the mental 
anguish, and spiritual sorrow which come to the 
good the pure and the righteous in earth. 



CHAPTEB IV. 

BILDAD, JOB'S SECOND FRIEND.— INDIVIDUALITY IN LIFE 
AND INDIVIDUALITY IN SUFFERING. 

A second friend who came to Job was Bildad. 
This friend also comes to every suffering creature, 
in the thought and in the acceptance of the truth, 
that God's wisdom is infinite. Bildad stands, figur- 
atively, for this truth, and for the assurances which 
the soul possesses of this truth. Bildad also takes 
up the cause of God and argues with the soul which 
suffers, pleading the infinite wisdom of Him who 
permits, nay requires suffering. In that pleading 
let us follow as God gives to us the power to under- 
stand. Life must be considered in its broad sense 
of covering all created intelligent existence; and 
further, that the happiness of such life is preserved 
to those who possess happiness, through the suffer- 
ing of those who suffer. With these two thoughts 
in mind we take up this subject and treat it in the 
following manner. 

First. Individual life is not an individual gift to 
the one possessing it, but aggregate life is an aggre- 
gate gift to all who possess it. 

Second. Individual life must ever be eliminated 
when we consider questions of moral government and 
of God's infinite attributes. 

Third. Individuality of life is an impossible con- 

52 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 53 

ception when the laws of life are applied to aggre- 
gate life. 

Fourth. This will lead us to the conclusion that 
while the individuality of our life is an experienced 
truth, it is also a delusion when we seek to apply to 
it the revelation and the laws of God, the Father. 

First. When we consider our own life, what it 
is, the purpose for which it has been given us, and 
the results which spring from its existence, we are 
disposed to think of it as an individual gift to our- 
selves. This would place us in a different relation- 
ship towards God our Creator, than that in which 
we really stand. This would require a different in- 
terpretation of God's revelations and a different un- 
derstanding of his laws than that which is correct. 
On the basis of the individuality of human life, 
God's revelations and his laws are in many par- 
ticulars inexplicable. On the basis of the unity, of 
the oneness, of all created intelligent life, they all 
become explicable. It therefore becomes a matter 
of necessity for a correct understanding of this rev- 
elation and these laws, that we form a correct con- 
clusion as to what we are and why we are, and this 
is the purpose of these thoughts. In reaching this 
conclusion we must take into account all created ex- 
istence, that which is above us and that which is be- 
neath us. All created existence is of God, is a part 
of God, is a revelation of God, and as such it is 
and must be one harmonious and perfect work and 
revelation of God. To omit therefrom any one order 
of life now existing would destroy the perfection of 
the whole, both as a work and as a revelation. In 



54 THE BOOK OF JOB 

this truth lies the necessity for the creation of man, 
and for his creation on the plane of intelligent ex- 
istence which man occupies. If God had created 
man upon a higher plane of intelligent existence 
than that which he occupies, it would have left his 
work and his revelation imperfect, inasmuch as there 
would then have remained one possible plane of in- 
telligent existence unoccupied. God could not create 
man upon a lower plane of intelligent existence than 
that which he occupies, and endow him with an in- 
telligence sufficient to enable him to recognize and 
know his own Creator. The power to do this is the 
boundary line which divides intelligent from non- 
intelligent life. There is no creature below man 
which can recognize and know God. This is a pos- 
sibility to all men, but is attained by comparatively 
few men, so few that it makes it certain that there 
can be no further subdivision of intelligent exist- 
ence in a downward scale, and that therefore man, 
created as an intelligent and morally responsible 
creature closed the last link in a chain of manifested 
life from the lowest form of material existence where- 
in life can be manifested, up to the highest form of 
spiritual existence wherein life is manifested. 

Man has existed upon the earth morally irre- 
sponsible, too low in the degree of his intelligence 
to know, or to attain unto the knowledge of his Cre- 
ator, during his material existence. Whether such 
human beings can attain unto such knowledge dur- 
ing their spiritual existence, is a question not neces- 
sary to be considered here. We do find, however, 
that in the progress of manifested life, from the 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 55 

lowest forms of life upwards, there came a period 
when man was sufficiently endowed to enable him 
during earthly life, to find and to know his Creator. 
This new endowment constituted the beginning of 
the Adamic race. I speak now of man distinctively 
and not of mankind. The percentage of men who 
exert their powers and attain unto this knowledge 
is so small, that it carries with it the proof that any 
lower degree of intelligence, than that bestowed up- 
on men, would fail utterly in ennabling its possessors 
to acquire this knowledge. Men therefore occupy the 
very lowest plane of intelligent existence, wherein 
it is possible for them to acquire such knowledge. 
Not so of woman. Woman is human as man is hu- 
man. They are of one and the same race but not of 
one and the same degree of intelligence. Woman is 
endowed with a higher degree of intelligence than is 
man. Woman's life is a manifestation of life upon a 
higher plane of intelligent existence than is man's life. 
Woman's life subdivides the span which lies between 
man's existence and angelic existence. More women 
find and know God than do men. This is because 
they are one step nearer God in the plain of intelli- 
gent existence which they occupy. Now understand 
me, the word intelligence and the term intelligent 
existence as used herein are applied wholly to spirit- 
ual knowledge and to spiritual understanding. They 
have no reference whatever to matters pertaining to 
our present material existence. In all such matters 
men excel women. God so created them and no hu- 
man effort can ever change the order of that cre- 
ation. 



56 THE BOOK OF JOB 

We find therefore one continuous chain of mani- 
fested life from the lowest form wherein it is pos- 
sible for life to be manifested through a material 
existence, up to the highest form of spiritual exist- 
ence made known to us through God's revelation. 
Of this chain man forms one link. Woman forms 
another, and angelic life a third. If you deny the 
power to ascend along this chain you cannot deny 
the power to descend along it, and even this is all 
we need as a premise for our conclusion. This 
chain of life in its entirety, is a manifestation of 
the life of God, is an expression of God's life, is a 
revelation to us and to all intelligent creatures, of 
God's life. As such it is now a perfect work, a per- 
fect manifestation, and will become a perfect revela- 
tion. In this chain the human race occupies a place. 
It was created to fill that place, to perfect the work, 
the manifestation, and the revelation. That it should 
be thus created was a necessity, not a necessity to 
or for the human race itself, but a necessity to the 
continued happiness of all intelligent creatures su- 
perior to the human race. To meet this necessity 
the individual of the human race is nothing, the race 
itself is everything. God therefore purposed from 
the beginning to create a human race which would 
fill the span between the unintelligent existence be- 
low man and angelic existence above man. That 
race must subserve the purpose of its creation. It 
must demonstrate the truth that no lower form of 
intelligent existence is possible wherein the creature 
can find and know its Creator, and it must also 
demonstrate the truth that no further subdivision 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 57 

of intelligent existence can intervene between man- 
kind and angelic existence. In order that these 
necessities be met woman is created higher than man, 
and both are endowed with spiritual natures, spiritual 
powers, and the possibility of spiritual life. The 
number of the human race among men and like- 
wise among women, who shall exert these powers 
and attain spiritual life is of necessity limited. What 
that number in each case may be, is alone known to 
God; but man can comprehend this truth, that if 
the whole human race should attain unto spiritual 
life by seeking and finding and knowing God, then 
it would be self-evident that there might be a plane 
of intelligent existence below the human, wherein a 
creature still less endowed than the human, might 
be able to seek, find and know its Creator. If the 
one-half of the human race should seek, know and 
find their Creator, would it not point to the ex- 
istence of the same possibility? We as mortals with 
mortal powers, can alone say, that God with in- 
finite wisdom and in infinite love, has so endowed 
man and has so endowed woman, that the greatest 
possible number of each, shall seek, find, and know 
him, and yet the necessity for the creation of the 
human race be met. 

When then we study human existence we must 
consider it as a whole, and must eliminate all indi- 
viduality from it. It is true that individuality is 
an incident of it, a necessary incident, but it does 
not follow that it was the purpose for which human 
life was created. To grasp that purpose, we must 
consider human existence alone as links in that chain 



58 THE BOOK OF JOB 

of created existence, which manifests and proclaims 
the existence of God. "When we thus take up the 
study of human life, what do we find? Unity of 
design in the creation of life, from the highest to 
the lowest, manifesting all the attributes which are 
revealed as being possessed by God. These are in- 
finite power, infinite wisdom, infinite love. When 
we permit individuality of human existence to enter 
into this study, what do we find? Infinite power 
alone, coupled with lack of infinite wisdom, and 
absence of infinite love. From the standpoint of 
individuality these latter attributes are not and can- 
not be revealed. From such standpoint we cannot 
discover infinite wisdom in the wrecks of human 
lives which through unknown centuries have paved 
the way over which the race has traveled from its 
first to its present state. Human lives blighted by 
the choice of sin, by physical suffering through dis- 
ease, pestilence, calamities and war, by mental an- 
guish and by spiritual sorrow, or lost by what to 
us seems premature death, present to our backward 
view, these wrecks, even as would appear the bones 
of the fallen and the lost, piled to unmeasured depths. 
One man pursuing this way, ascends into spiritual 
life. Two women follow and enter with him into 
such estate. The many choose disobedience. Is it 
infinite wisdom that the human race be so created 
and endowed that the few be saved and the many 
be lost? Is it infinite love which saves the few out 
of the many, and bestows spiritual life and all of 
its joys upon them, and that condemns the many to 
spiritual death with all its endless sorrow? From 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 59 

the viewpoint of individuality it is not possible that 
either of these attributes be manifested by and 
through the course of human life as experienced and 
observed by us all. From the viewpoint of the one- 
ness of all created life, and the unity of all created 
intelligent existence, these attributes are declared by 
and may be seen in the condemnation and destruc- 
tion of the many and the salvation of the few, of 
the human race. It is with this thought that we pass 
to the second subdivision of our theme. 

Second. Individuality of life must ever be elimi- 
nated when we consider questions of moral govern- 
ment and God's infinite attributes. Individual life 
counts for nothing as against the welfare of all who 
possess life. This truth underlies all government, 
whether it be the moral government of God or the 
civil government of the state. If the welfare of the 
race, and through the race of all intelligent crea- 
tures, is to be subserved by the taking of my life 
in infancy, in youth, in early manhood, in the prime 
of life, or in old age, God so takes it. The same is 
true of every individual life in human existence. 
I am in earth-life today, because my continued ex- 
istence here still best subserves the good of all. 
When the hour comes that the good of all shall be 
subserved by my death, in that hour I shall die. 
Life was not bestowed upon me for the joy it brings 
to me, and earthly existence will not be taken from 
me for any reasons pertaining to myself. I was 
created for the good of all. I will die for the good 
of all, even as infinite wisdom has foreordained and 
purposed. 



60 THE BOOK OF JOB 

As with me, so with every individual of the hu- 
man race. We are created and we are taken to fulfill 
a race purpose, not an individual purpose of the Al- 
mighty. While it must be true that an individual 
purpose concerning us enters into and is a part of 
the race purpose, the race purpose must always be 
paramount, and the individual purpose subject 
thereto. Individually, we may liken our life to the 
life of a leaf of the forest. It springs, it matures, 
it falls. May be in the springing it is blighted, is 
torn, is consumed; may be in midsummer it falls; 
may be it reaches autumn sear, but always it has 
done its part as one of an innumerable multitude. 
So we as individuals live, and so we die, and our 
life counts no more in fulfilling the purpose for 
which the race was created, than does the one leaf 
in fulfilling the purpose for which the foliage of the 
forest was created. Infinite love knows no difference 
between the life of the leaf and the life of the in- 
dividual of the human race. Each is created for a 
purpose and each dies when that purpose is fulfilled. 
By the same law are they created, by the same law 
they pass out of earthly existence. 

Third. Individuality of life is an impossible 
conception when the laws of life are applied to ag- 
gregate life. Aggregate human life exists to meet 
the necessity which called it into being. Individual 
human life exists to meet the necessity which exists 
because of aggregate human life. It does not exist 
to meet the necessity which called aggregate human 
life into being. This is a distinction which means 
much and which must be kept in mind when apply- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 61 

ing the laws of life to human life, and when apply- 
ing infinite attributes to individual life. If this dis- 
tinction is not recognized and accepted, we affirm 
that it is impossible to reconcile the infinite attrib- 
utes of God with the experiences of individual life, 
and it is also impossible to comprehend the laws of 
life. Throughout the existence of man on earth, the 
intelligent conscious soul has gone out towards its 
God in an exclamation and a prayer giving ex- 
pression to this thought, Why do I exist? Why do 
I suffer? Life is a burden to many throughout its 
human existence. It is one long black hour of suf- 
fering, sorrow and discontent. Men curse the day 
which gave them birth, even as Job cursed the day 
which gave him birth. They pour out their soul in 
lamentations over that which human existence holds 
for them. They grow weary of life and seek oblivion 
through death. Such an one is asked to reconcile 
his sufferings, his sorrows, the bitterness of his hu- 
man existence, with infinite love, which he knows in 
his heart is an attribute of his God, if he accepts 
the truth of God's existence. Such reconcilement 
is an impossibility if attempted individually. It 
can only be made when human life is considered in 
the aggregate. This failure to make such reconcile- 
ment with the individual life is one of the sorest 
trials to Which the believing Christian is subjected. 
It sometimes proves fatal to belief. 

Fourth. This leads us to the conclusion that 
while individuality of life is an experienced truth, 
it is also a delusion when we seek to apply it to the 
revelation and the laws of God our Father. It is a 



62 THE BOOK OF JOB 

truth because we experience and know it. I am dis- 
tinct in my life from all other human life. My life 
is independent of all other human life. It always 
has been so, save that God used other human lives 
to bring mine into existence. This he did simply 
and solely as a method of creation. The act of my 
creation is God's act. The power which spoke my 
life into existence is God's power. The fact that he 
used human instrumentality detracts nothing from 
that power, neither does it transfer any of that 
power from the author to the instrument. The 
method by which life is bestowed is wholly inde- 
pendent of life itself. Man might have come into 
existence by any other method, had God so chosen, 
and the necessity for human life been equally met; 
for it is not the method of producing human life, 
but the existence of human life itself which meets 
the necessity for such life. Infinite wisdom designed 
the method for the reproduction of human life, after 
that life had once been created, to meet the neces- 
sity which grows out of the existence of human life, 
and not to meet the necessity for the existence of 
human life. When human life was bestowed it im- 
mediately brought into existence necessities which 
attach to its existence and which are independent 
of its origin. These necessities have been met through 
the laws of selection, heredity, and suffering. By 
and through these laws God makes the soul of man 
all it is or ever can be, and he makes it what it is 
through its own free choice between obedience and 
worship, or disobedience and refusal to worship. The 
necessities in the one case and in the other differ in 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 63 

their origin. The necessity which brought human 
life with human endowment into existence, rests 
upon and springs from the welfare and happiness 
of all created intelligences above the human race. 
The necessities which govern individuality in the 
human race, spring from and rest upon the existence 
of the human race itself. The former are and must 
forever be in harmony with the infinite attributes 
of God. The latter must be consistent with the 
former alone and through them alone must be har- 
monized with such infinite attributes. 

These thoughts bring us face to face with the 
problems of our relation as individuals to God the 
Creator of the human race. These are problems 
which have vexed the righteous soul from the begin- 
ning of conscious accountability. To understand why 
God gives suffering to one and joy to another; gives 
long life to one and cuts another off in infancy, in 
childhood, or in the vigor of middle age, has been 
the intense desire and the unceasing effort of the 
good and the pure in all ages of the world. The cup 
of human misery is an overflowing cup to a large 
portion of the human kind. It it drunk by the 
good, the pure, the righteous, and it is also drunk 
by the impure, the evil and the unrighteous. The 
fact of the soul's obedience or of its disobedience 
appears to have no effect upon this draught which 
is forced upon the unwilling recipient. I have said 
that obedience and disobedience appear to have no 
effect upon such suffering. Let us ask the question, 
right here, fairly and unreservedly, Have they any 
such effect? Let us answer this question as fairly 



64 THE BOOK OF JOB 

and unreservedly, and say: They have not. This 
then presents for our consideration this proposition. 
Human misery, sorrow and suffering, in so far as 
they are not the result of individual crime, are not 
dependent upon or affected by the obedience or the 
disobedience of the soul to its God. They come 
whether the soul is obedient or is disobedient. They 
continue until they have served the purposes for 
which they were sent, whether the suffering soul is 
obedient or is disobedient. They are not a punish- 
ment for disobedience, and their opposites, health, 
prosperity and contentment, are not a reward for 
obedience. 

Rewards and punishments do not exist in the 
government of God. Effects following causes, by 
fixed and changeless laws, do exist in God's gov- 
ernment; but human misery, sorrow and suffering, 
are not such effects, save only as they may be the 
result of individual crime. Why then do they come 
to the righteous and to the unrighteous alike? To 
meet the necessities that spring from the creation 
of the human race, even as that creation itself met 
and fulfilled a pre-existing necessity, compelling it. 
Why human misery, sorrow and suffering are neces- 
sities springing from the creation and existence of 
the human race upon the human plane of existence, 
has been fully considered, and in this connection 
we have nothing to do but to accept them as facts 
known to us all. Why then does one individual 
suffer and not another? This is the crucial ques- 
tion which tries the strength of the believing, the 
loving, the obedient soul. Can we answer it? We 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 65 

can, according to the knowledge which God has 
given ns. 

In answering it we will follow the following line 
of thought. 

First. The life of the individual is inseparable 
from the life of the human race as a whole, when 
we seek to answer this question. 

Second. Individuality of existence is therefore 
eliminated from all thoughts bearing upon this sub- 
ject, and it resolves itself into an inquiry as to why 
suffering exists at all. 

Third. Admitting the necessity for human suf- 
fering and eliminating individuality of life from 
the consideration it resolves itself into this proposi- 
tion: Human life falls to man, as sub-human life 
falls to the brute; as vegetable life falls to the vege- 
table kingdom; as inanimate existence falls to in- 
animate matter. The law of creation and the law 
of being, is one and the same to each. 

First. When we consider human misery, sorrow 
and suffering there is no individuality of life. We 
as individuals are simply bearing a part of a com- 
mon load, which of necessity has been placed upon 
the human race to be borne. How then is this com- 
mon load distributed? Is it by law, as effect follow- 
ing cause, by chance, or by the purpose of God? It 
is not by law, save as the law of necessity places 
the burden upon the human race. It is not by 
chance, because there is no chance in the govern- 
ment of God. It is therefore by the purpose of 
God, directly and unqualifiedly. What can we then 
say of the purpose of God in predestinating and 



66 THE BOOK OF JOB 

foreordaining some individuals to suffering, sorrow 
and misery, and other individuals to their opposites, 
during human existence? Is it consistent and har- 
monious with the attribute of infinite love? When 
the individual life of the sufferer is considered as 
in direct relationship with God, it is irreconcilable 
with such attribute and it becomes inexplicable. 

When the individual life of the sufferer is con- 
sidered in its relation with human life as a whole, 
and then human life as a whole in its relation with 
God the Creator of it, it is reconcilable and har- 
monious with the attribute of infinite love. 

We have seen that the creation of the human 
race met and fulfilled a pre-existing necessity for 
such creation. We have also seen that the creation 
of the human race, itself created the necessity for 
human suffering, sorrow and misery. With infinite 
wisdom and in infinite love God has distributed this 
burden of suffering, sorrow and misery, which the 
necessities of its own existence places upon the hu- 
man race, among the individuals of that race, where 
it will yield the largest results in good to the great- 
est number of souls. In doing this the individual 
cannot enter into the purpose of God; the ultimate 
results and the good of all creatures, must so enter. 
The line between individual human life and life as 
a whole or as a race is thus sharply drawn. Let us 
dwell upon this thought until we comprehend it and 
have it fairly fixed in our minds, for it is the key 
that unlocks the mystery of human suffering, sorrow 
and misery, and reconciles them with the attribute 
of infinite love. While it is true that I am an indi- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 67 

vidual of the human race and as such have an abso- 
lutely distinct and separate existence from all other 
creatures, yet life has not been bestowed upon me 
as an individual in any sense whatever. I have no 
individuality of relationship when it comes to my 
relationship with God. I have no claims upon God 
as an individual creature. I have a claim upon God 
as one of a race of creatures which claim is common 
to the race as such. I can not segregate myself 
and deal directly with my Creator. I have no claim 
upon him as an individual. I have the common 
claim of all humanity upon him, that and nothing 
more. In bestowing life upon me God entered into 
no implied covenant or obligation with me as an 
individual. It is not so with that aggregate indi- 
viduality constituting the human race; with such he 
is in covenant relationship, and is under such obli- 
gations as are implied by his own infinite attributes. 
Individually I can claim such covenants and bring 
myself within such obligations alone through my 
race as an aggregate whole. This is the thought 
that I wish to impress: As an individual my only 
claim upon my Creator is through my race; I have 
no claims upon him which are separate from such 
race claims or which are separate and distinct from 
the claims of all other individuals of the race. From 
this the truth becomes apparent that God's dealings 
with the individual do not constitute an expression 
of infinite love, but that his dealings with the entire 
race as a whole do constitute such expression. 

Second. It follows therefore that individuality 
of existence is eliminated from all inquiries of this 



68 THE BOOK OF JOB 

kind and they resolve themselves into the inquiry 
as to why human suffering, sorrow and misery exist 
at all. This inquiry we have disposed of according 
to the light, knowledge and understanding which we 
possess and we can add no more thereto. 

Third. We therefore pass to the third and last 
thought outlined, which is: Admitting the necessity 
for human suffering and eliminating individuality 
of life from its consideration, it resolves itself into 
this proposition: Human life comes to man as sub- 
human life comes to the brute; as vegetable life 
comes to the vegetable kingdom; as inanimate exist- 
ence comes to inanimate matter; the law of creation 
and the law of being are one and the same in each 
case. 

Life in kind is the basis for the consideration of 
all concerning life. By life in kind, we mean, there 
is one life which is the life of man, another which 
is the life of the brute, another which is the life of 
the bird, another of fishes, another of insects 
throughout their innumerable varieties. Each kind 
of life is distinctive and is separate from all other 
kinds of life. To all these kinds of life we can apply 
the laws of life and the infinite attributes of the 
Creator and find nothing in conflict between them. 
This we cannot do when we individualize any one 
of these kinds of life and then seek to apply these 
laws and these attributes to such individual. Take 
any one variety or kind of life and attempt this 
and what have we? One individual suffers, another 
escapes suffering ; one individual finds food in abund- 
ance, another perishes for lack of food; one indi- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 69 

vidual suffers or dies in order that another indi- 
vidual of the same or of a different order of life, be 
brought into life or be sustained in life, while an- 
other escapes such suffering and death. There is 
not one kind of life known to man, from his own 
down to the lowest microscopical forms of existence 
discernible, wherein this truth is not manifested. 
What does this fact alone teach us? That it is a 
law of life, common to all life known to us, that 
individuality of existence is subordinated to and in- 
separably connected with the aggergate existence to 
which it belongs. When this law is applied to human 
existence, man being a rational creature, it means 
this, that man cannot separate his individual exist- 
ence from aggregate human existence, and hold God 
accountable to himself as such individual. This Job 
tried to do, and in this Job failed as all others must 
likewise fail. 

Man's life therefore comes to the individual 
human being as a part of an aggregate human exist- 
ence and it is as a part of such aggregate whole that 
he bears his burden of suffering, sorrow and misery, 
or seizes upon and delights in their opposites. What- 
ever of suffering, sorrow and misery is necessitated 
because of human existence, must be borne by some 
individuals possessing such existence. It is not pos- 
sible that all should bear these in equal proportions, 
for if all were thus afflicted then it would be impos- 
sible for the race to fulfill the purposes for which 
it was created. The ends of human existence could 
not be met if all human beings were thus afflicted, 
neither could such ends be met if no human being 



70 THE BOOK OF JOB 

suffered more than what would be his average lot. 
The individual must suffer as an individual for the 
good of all. This law of creation, this law of life, 
is stamped upon all life. Human life is not an 
exception. It is the highest expression of one com- 
mon law of all life. 

We therefore can plainly and properly draw one 
conclusion from what we see and know of all life. 
It is this: The individual suffers and dies to fulfill 
a burden -placed upon the aggregate life of which 
the individual life is a part. We will illustrate 
this. It is the burden placed upon one kind of 
animal life to sustain and perpetuate another kind 
of animal life. This it does by certain individuals 
possessing such life, dying as a prey to individuals 
possessing the other kind of life. Now all individuals 
of the first order cannot thus suffer and die, else 
the order itself would become extinct and fail to 
fulfill one of the purposes of its creation. Hence 
some individuals of the orders fall a prey, suffer, 
and die, while other individuals of the order escape 
this fate and live out the full measure of their 
natural life, enjoying all that such life contains for 
them. It does not occur to humanity to charge God 
with partiality towards the individuals of this order, 
yet such a charge would lie against infinite love, as 
surely and certainly in its dealings with the lower 
orders of life as with man, for a love that is infinite 
can know no distinction between the highest and 
the lowest of creatures. The individual of this lower 
order which thus suffers torture, terror, physical 
pain, and surrenders its life, suffers and surrenders 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 71 

all that any human creature can be called upon to 
suffer and surrender. It suffers all the terror that 
is possible to it ; all the pain that is possible for it to 
suffer; and surrenders all the pleasure that life 
brings to it. This is all that man can do. An intelli- 
gent human creature can not apply the truth of 
infinite love to these several individuals of this lower 
order of life and find consistency. An intelligent 
human creature can apply the truth of infinite love 
to the order of life to which these individuals be- 
long, in its relation with all other orders of life both 
above and below it, and find consistency. That which 
is true of the individuals of this lower order, is true 
of the individuals of the human order of life. We 
might multiply this illustration by hundreds and by 
thousands. They are about us in our daily life from 
our infancy to our death. They enter into that which 
we daily eat ; that which we daily do ; that which we 
daily see. We as one order of life live upon and are 
sustained by individuals of other orders. We in- 
flict terror, pain and death upon individuals of other 
orders, not upon all individuals of other orders, but 
upon certain ones only. We hesitate not to take life. 
We assert it as a natural right to do so. So it is, 
and if we doubt this right all we have to do to be 
confirmed in its truth is to look into Nature about 
us and see the law under which that right exists, 
stamped upon and revealed by all creation. This is 
so clear that but few hesitate concerning it. We 
forget that the life of the smallest and of the lowest 
of creatures is as precious in the sight of our infinite 
Creator as is the life of man, and that the lowest 



72 THE BOOK OF JOB 

life is created under, sustained by, and taken because 
of the same laws of creation, of life, and of death, 
as those under which man was created, now lives and 
must die. God's laws are not only changeless, but 
they are universal in their application. If therefore 
we may deduce a law from what we see and know 
of the lower orders of life about us, we may with 
full assurance and safety apply that same law to the 
human race. God takes the life of man as we take 
the life of the orders beneath us and subject to our 
dominion and control; and as one order below us 
takes the life of another order below us; it is all 
done under one and the same law. 



CHAPTER V. 

'S LIFE ON EAR! 
ENVIRONMENT. — THE SOUL'S CONCEPTION OF GOD. 

The way of man's life on earth is a way of 
mystery. This thought is one of deepest interest 
to all who seek the truths which lie hidden or par- 
tially hidden about them in God's physical and moral 
universe. Between the two days upon which the 
last two sentences were respectively penned, a life 
has gone out and a nation mourns. I could almost 
say a world mourns, for in every land where Wm. 
McKinley was known as the director of a nation's 
mighty power, there is sincere sorrow as I pen these 
words. The mystery of the way of life is intensi- 
fied by his death, which presents this thought so 
forcibly that it eannot escape the consideration of 
the thoughtful. I cannot refrain from this allusion 
to a passing event so deeply impressed upon the 
thought of the world at this hour, and if this event 
shall serve to render clearer to myself the thoughts 
which I shall pen this hour, may it not serve like- 
wise to render them clearer to those who shall read 
them in future years? Life is not of our own seek- 
ing or of our own getting. It is forced upon us. 
We either receive it gladly and thank our Creator 
for the gift to us or we receive it sullenly and curse 
the day upon which we were born. There is no 
medium sentiment between these two extremes. "We 

73 



74 THE BOOK OF JOB 

are not indifferent to life. We either love it or we 
hate it. We either cling to it or we wish to flee 
from it. During certain moments or hours or days 
we may claim indifference; that we neither love life 
nor hate it, neither cling to it nor desire to escape 
it, but such claims and feelings if they do exist are 
merely transitory and are not settled convictions of 
the soul. These come with broadened experiences, 
more matured thought and as final conclusions of 
the soul. They depend upon the soul's choice be- 
tween obedience and disobedience, between worship 
and the withholding of worship. 

We assert that no soul which seeks obedience and 
worship is either indifferent to its own life or hates 
its own life. We further assert that no soul which 
withholds obedience and worship either clings to or 
loves its own life. For our race there can be no mean 
between these two extremes of sentiment. All cre- 
ated intelligent beings will therefore be finally 
divided into two classes; the one, grateful for, cling- 
ing to and loving its own life; the other, ungrateful 
for, seeking to escape and hating its own life. As 
we had no part in the bestowal of our own life, 
neither can we ever escape from or destroy it. We 
are born to live forever. This truth but deepens the 
mystery which shadows the way of man's life. What 
we have asserted are truths which we believe will 
be accepted because of what we know concerning our 
own lives and of what we observe concerning the lives 
of those about us. The problem of human life is 
therefore presented to us about in this form: By 
the will and fiat of our Creator life is bestowed upon 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 75 

a race of beings which we call human, and of which 
race we are individual members. Neither as a race 
nor as individuals have we had any power to stay, 
or choice in the matter of the bestowal of this gift. 
We are the helpless and unconscious recipients of that 
which our Creator bestows upon us. This is true of 
not merely the simple fact of life, but it is equally 
true of the environment by which that life is sur- 
rounded and of the inherited characteristics which 
come with it and are a part of it. Experience, ob- 
servation and revelation unite in establishing the 
truth that this human life in its human state con- 
tains more of sorrow than it does of joy. Revelation 
confirms this truth as applied to an endless spiritual 
existence. Throughout the eternity to come, com- 
paratively few of the human race will love the life 
which is theirs, which is their very selves, and com- 
paratively many will hate that same life and long 
to escape it. 

This being the problem of life presented, the 
mystery is to find the law and the purpose which 
leads the few into the one class and the many into the 
other class, and then to reconcile this law and this 
purpose with the truth of God's infinite and equal 
love for all his creatures. Second only to this deep- 
est mystery is that other one which attaches to the 
way of the life of the individual in his human state. 
These two problems comprise that which is most 
mysterious in our existence and we will take them 
up in their order. 

The truth that the sorrow connected with human 
existence, both here and hereafter, exceeds the joy, 



76 THE BOOK OF JOB 

need not be further discussed. It will be accepted 
by the great majority, either from personal experi- 
ence, from observation or from revelation. Then 
the thought presented is, Why was the human race 
created? Why is it continued through so many 
ages of ever increasing births? The only answer 
to these inquiries that can satisfy the soul of man 
is the one which has heretofore been given in these 
writings. The creation of the human race was a 
necessity in order that the Creator might reveal him- 
self to his intelligent creatures by and through a 
perfect work of creation. Such revelation was itself 
a necessity in order that the happiness of these same 
creatures might be perpetuated, established and for- 
ever confirmed to them. To do this all degrees or 
planes of intelligent existence and of non-intelligent 
existence, which were capable of manifesting life, 
must so manifest and declare it. Such perfection 
of the creative work was attained by the creation 
of man and of woman, as morally responsible intelli- 
gent beings. 

Thus the creative work was finished. The reve- 
lation of God to his intelligent creatures was not 
yet perfected. This required the working out of the 
destiny of the human race through the course of 
its human existence. When this shall have been 
accomplished, then shall that revelation itself be- 
come perfect. The purpose and the necessity which 
brought the human race into existence will then be 
fulfilled and met. If it be true that an arch-angel 
rebelled and fell through the sin of disobedience 
and that the one-half of the angelic host followed 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 77 

his leadership into rebellion and sin, then may we 
reasonably accept this further truth, that it was 
possible that intelligent beings might be created upon 
a still lower plane than that of angelic life and that 
some individuals of such creation would choose to 
seek and would choose to obey their Creator. As long 
as this truth existed and the human race remained 
uncreated the work of creation remained imperfect 
and as such it could not declare and reveal a per- 
fect and infinite Creator. This is the necessity and 
this the purpose which brought the human race into 
existence as intelligent and morally responsible crea- 
tures. The same law, the same necessity, the same 
purpose which brought the human race into being, 
that a perfect work of creation might declare and 
reveal a perfect and an infinite Creator to super- 
human intelligences, brought into being all sub- 
human life, that this same truth might be declared 
and revealed to all human beings who will receive 
and accept the revelation. Human beings were and 
are created therefore not for the joy or the sorrow 
which must come to them as individuals; not for 
the worship which they render unto their Creator; 
not for the pleasure of their Creator, for God can- 
not delight in suffering, sorrow and sin; but to 
establish and forever confirm the happiness of all 
creatures, of whatever state and degree of intelli- 
gence their existence may be, who know their Cre- 
ator, and who obey and worship him. It were better 
that many should suffer and sorrow and perish in 
spiritual death, than that all intelligent creatures, 
or that all of any one degree of intelligence should 



78 THE BOOK OF JOB 

enter into spiritual death through doubt of their 
Creator's existence, leading them into disobedience 
and sin. Such doubt certainly did exist and cer- 
tainly would have continued to exist but for the 
creation of the human race with its endowments. 

We have thus found the law and the purpose 
which leads the many into the choice of disobedi- 
ence and spiritual death and the few into the choice 
of obedience and spiritual life. Now can we har- 
monize this law and this purpose with the equal 
and infinite love of God towards all his creatures? 
Let us consider then this thought. 

Life which is sub-human has been created for 
the benefit of the human race. Whether it has also 
been created for the benefit of any super-human 
beings, we need not consider. To man, this sub- 
human life is a part of an infinite revelation of 
God as his Creator. Man cannot comprehend the 
infinity of this revelation, but he can comprehend 
that span of it which he can grasp within his lim- 
ited powers and this is sufficient to reveal God to 
him as a perfect Creator, according to his power 
of comprehending perfection. This is all that any 
degree of intelligence below the infinite can do. 
What then do we find among the orders of life 
below our own? One is created for another, and 
each is endowed according to the purpose of its 
creation. One order of life becomes food to sustain 
and perpetuate another order of life. Individuals 
of one order cease to live in order that individuals 
of another order may continue to live. The indi- 
viduals of the one order endure physical suffering, 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 79 

the agony of torturing fear and finally surrender their 
lives to the individuals of the other order. Does 
God love the devouring animal more, and the inno- 
cent, terrorized, tortured and finally devoured animal 
the less? No one could or would assert this to be 
the truth. God's love for all his creatures is equal, 
being infinite, and not a sparrow falleth to the 
ground without our heavenly Father's notice. Why 
then does the one devour and the other yield up life 1 
The only answer is, To meet the necessity for the 
manifestation of life upon the planes of life requir- 
ing such manifestation. Such illustrations can be 
drawn, almost without number, from the whole range 
of life below the human plane. These facts teach 
us this truth, that no order of life or no individual 
of any order of life, is created for itself alone. Each 
order and each individual of all orders are created 
in reference to other orders and to individuals of 
the same or of other orders. Not one individual 
creature below, man has an existence which is inde- 
pendent of the existence of other individuals of the 
same or of other orders. The whole creation of sub- 
human life is a perfect work of creation, or rather 
is a subdivision of an entire perfect work of 
creation, in which each individual of every order 
of life bears some relation either intimate or remote 
to every other individual of all other orders. 
The omission of one order would result in the 
destruction of another order. In this subdivision 
of creation which we are considering, each indi- 
vidual of every order fulfills a purpose and per- 
forms a duty which bears directly upon the welfare 



80 THE BOOK OF JOB 

and the perpetuation of all the orders, and of all 
the other individuals having life within this sub- 
division. That duty may be the surrendering of its 
own life, either with or without suffering, torture 
and fear. In fulfilling this duty it but fulfills the 
purpose of God in its creation as an individual. We 
recognize all this as natural and right and as mani- 
festing nothing in conflict with the infinite attri- 
butes of our Creator. When the same truths and 
facts are applied to the human race, we recoil from 
the acceptance of them and may even charge the 
Almighty with manifesting a greater love for one 
individual than for another, forgetful that infinite 
love can make no distinction between creatures 
whether they be the humblest or the highest. Can 
we not comprehend from these illustrations the 
necessity and the law of our creation as intelligent 
human beings? Any law and any necessity which 
can be rightly applied to any one subdivision of 
God's creation must be applied to that entire crea- 
tion, and must include and embrace every individual 
of every order of that creation. 

We come now to the second thought, the mystery 
of the way of the life of the individual in its 
human state. We have found the necessity which 
led to the creation of the human race, as well as 
the necessity which gave to it that degree of intel- 
ligence with which it is endowed, and we have now 
to harmonize the way of the life of the individual 
with these two necessities. This is not an easy thing 
to do, but God has given to us the power to compre- 
hend that there is such harmony if we will but make 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 81 

the effort to comprehend it. The first of these 
necessities placed man on a plane of intelligent ex- 
istence, below angelic existence and above the non- 
intelligent existence of other animal life. The 
second necessity placed man's intelligence so low 
that there could be no further subdivision of an 
intelligent existence between man's and the highest 
non-intelligent existence of animal life. In truth 
man himself was once a non-intelligent animal, irre- 
sponsible morally, and therefore incapable of sin. 
When man emerged from this state, through the 
Adamic race into a state of moral accountability, 
and when woman had been created subdividing and 
occupying the span of possible intelligent existence 
lying between that of man thus made morally ac- 
countable, and of angelic existence, then it was that 
God's creative work became complete and perfect. 
Intelligence and intelligent existence as I here use 
these terms in no sense apply to a comprehension of 
physical laws or to the powers of the creature to 
comprehend these laws. This is intelligence in its 
common and restricted sense, applicable exclusively 
to human existence. It is a power and an endow- 
ment which is wholly human and alone possible in 
human existence. Such intelligence ceases with 
human existence because of the soul's inability to 
further use those powers which bring such knowl- 
edge to it. Intelligence and intelligent existence in 
the broader sense as herein used, mean, the power 
of the creature to know and to comprehend its Cre- 
ator. This power varies from the feeblest possible 
manifestation of it in man to the highest possible 



82 THE BOOK OF JOB 

manifestation of it in the highest creature. This 
power and the exercise of it constitute intelligent 
existence and are the measure of that existence. 
Like all other powers of the soul it is capable of 
development and is developed according to the use 
made of it. It is manifest even to us, that no crea- 
ture with this power more rudimentary than it is 
in man would ever seek and find its Creator. It is 
also manifest to us that comparatively few men do 
this. It is equally manifest to us that a larger 
number of women than of men do this. We are 
therefore prepared to accept the following general 
assertion based upon these truths, namely: The 
human race must necessarily sink into spiritual 
darkness, to a much greater extent, than rise into 
spiritual life; the many must turn from their Cre- 
ator and sink into spiritual death ; the few must turn 
to their Creator, seek him, find him, and rise into 
spiritual life. Of necessity man was created for 
this destiny and he fulfills it. 

What are the causes which turn the few into the 
way of spiritual life and leave the many to sink 
into spiritual death? They all rest upon the free 
choice of the individual soul. Such choice rests 
upon the character of the individual soul. The same 
general character is common to all men and to all 
women, respectively, but individual character is also 
modified by causes uncontrolled by man. Among 
these are heredity and environment. These are con- 
trolled by God; heredity, absolutely, and environ- 
ment primarily, subject to modification by man. 
These God uses to save all that are saved. These 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 83 

causes divert the current of the soul's life, usually 
in its earliest course, and cause it to flow towards 
spiritual light and spiritual life, or away from 
these into spiritual death. Following up the 
thought the inquiry becomes, Why does God be- 
stow these causes upon the few and not upon all? 
The answer is that the necessity imposed upon him 
by the creation of innumerable beings higher than 
man holds him back therefrom. To save the entire 
human race would be to defeat the very necessity 
and purpose of its creation. To save the one-half 
of the human race would do the same thing. What 
proportion of the human race may be thus saved 
without defeating such necessity and purpose, we 
know not, but we do know that it is a small pro- 
portion, for Christ so declared in words which can- 
not be mistaken. God to fulfill this necessity and 
purpose created in Adam a new power, the power 
to know his Creator. He created in Eve the same 
power, intensified. These powers were an absolutely 
new creation, a new endowment bestowed upon 
human beings. They alone of all human beings 
then existing upon the earth, possessed these powers. 
To these powers were added environment, and a 
new race, morally responsible, came into existence. 
Heredity and environment thereafter became the 
instruments of God in perpetuating spiritual truth 
among human beings. The moving finger of God 
has written his will concerning the human race in 
these characters, from the creation of Adam and 
Eve to this hour and will continue so to write it 
until the end of time. The human race to the 



84 THE BOOK OF JOB 

utmost soul that this necessity will permit, is being 
saved by the infinite power of an infinitely loving 
God. This we may surely assert and may posi- 
tively know. When all this has been admitted as 
truth, the question then becomes: By what rule 
of justice and infinite love is it that the few are 
selected for salvation and the many for destruc- 
tion? Is this question capable of answer! It is 
partially so, but not wholly. Man in his weakness 
may not presume to know the secrets of the Al- 
mighty, except to the extent that the Almighty has 
revealed them to him. Let us seek, then, revela- 
tion upon this question. God's will is, not that all 
men should be saved, but that few men should be 
saved. The proof that such is God's will is the 
fact that such is the result of the creation and 
the perpetuation of the human race. To deny this 
assertion is to deny the possession of infinite attri- 
butes by God. Concerning this question there is no 
room for controversy. Infinite attributes could have 
saved all men if God had so willed. Let us examine 
this thought closely. To have saved all men from 
sin would have necessitated the taking from man, 
as now created, self-will and freedom of action. Man- 
kind could thus have been saved from sin, but no 
soul thus saved could have ever entered heaven. 
The reason for this is that the spiritual life, called 
heaven, is an effect following a distinct and posi- 
tive cause, which cause is the absolute submission 
and subjection of the soul's own free will, to the 
revealed will of its Creator. An effect cannot be 
created without the creation also of the cause pro- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 85 

ducing it. This, Omnipotence cannot do because it 
is self-contradictory to either assert it or to think of 
it as possible. Man's choice of the submission and 
the subjection of his own will to the revealed will 
of his Creator, depends wholly upon the clearness 
of his comprehension of his Creator's existence. 
This latter is governed by the degree of his intelli- 
gence, his spiritual intelligence. In this thought we 
have the key to the argument which follows. 

The higher the plane of intelligence upon which 
a distinctive order of beings is created, the larger 
is the proportion of such order of beings which 
will freely choose the submission and subjection of 
their own wills to the revealed will of their Creator, 
and the smaller the proportion which will refuse 
such submission and subjection. We have seen that 
the descending planes or degrees of intelligence, gov- 
erning in the creation of intelligent creatures, ended 
with the creation of man upon the lowest plane and 
with the most limited degree of intelligence. There- 
fore it follows that so much the larger proportion 
of the human race must choose disobedience as will 
prove the impossibility of creating a still lower 
order of beings than the human order, with intelli- 
gence sufficient to enable any one individual of such 
lower order to seek, to find and to know its Creator. 
We ourselves can comprehend that the creation of 
such lower order is an impossibility. This is dem- 
onstrated to us by the choice of the vast majority 
of the human race, which appears to us to be a 
refusal to submit and subject their own wills 
wholly to the revealed will of their Creator. It 



86 THE BOOK OF JOB 

being thus an impossibility that God should save 
from the effects of disobedience more than a small 
proportion of the entire accountable human race, 
he has chosen for such salvation those who are 
most powerfully influenced by heredity and en- 
vironment. That is to say, that from a start- 
ing point on a plane of spiritual intelligence so 
low that if left to uninfluenced choice no single 
human soul would have chosen and maintained obe- 
dience and submission, God has by the use of en- 
vironment and heredity, led to the free choice of 
obedience and submission, every human soul which 
it has been possible to reach. Remember, that these 
two means, environment and heredity, are all the 
means whereby God can possibly influence the soul 
of man to choose submission and obedience. It is 
only after voluntary submission and purposed obe- 
dience that God's Holy Spirit can reach, can aid, 
can enlighten, the soul of man. Conviction of sin 
cannot come from God's Holy Spirit. That must 
come from the soul itself by the voluntary use of 
its own spiritual powers. Otherwise an omnipotent 
God would become chargeable for a failure to con- 
vict every human creature of sin in so powerful a 
manner as to lead him to seek his Creator through 
obedience and submission. This is a power which 
God does not and cannot use. It is without the 
limits of the office of his Holy Spirit. Heredity is 
of God and we can surely assert that he uses this 
means to the utmost limit of the power and law of 
heredity in bringing souls to himself. Environment 
is of God primarily, but subject to modifications by 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 87 

man, and for the use of this means God is dependent 
upon the will and act of man in bringing about 
such modifications. This thought, this truth, should 
be a powerful incentive to the submissive and obe- 
dient soul in its efforts to cast about the benighted 
and disobedient of earth that environment which 
will aid most powerfully in leading to obedience 
and submission. It is thus that God works and 
has worked from the beginning of the Adamic race 
and will continue to work until the end of human 
life upon the earth, for the submission and obedi- 
ence of every human soul. Can we in our ignorance 
and weakness question the way of the Almighty? 
Let us rather thank and praise him for the use 
of these means which have led us individually into 
acceptance, submission and obedience, according to 
the light which he has bestowed upon us, and do 
all within our power to aid our heavenly Father's 
cause through the influences of human environment, 
by the use of the powers, the means and the oppor- 
tunities, which he has bestowed upon us, and as he 
through his Holy Spirit guides us. 

Whatever the soul considers perfect, that is God. 
No creature acknowledging God admits any imper- 
fection in him. Such admission would destroy the 
idea of God and would be unthinkable. It there- 
fore follows that God is to each soul, the highest 
ideal of perfection of which it has the power to 
conceive. Is this conception the same in all? It is 
not, and cannot possibly be made so. My ideal of 
perfection varies from your ideal of perfection, and 
both these vary from all others. It therefore fol- 



88 THE BOOK OF JOB 

lows that no two creatures can have precisely the 
same conception of God, whatever the degree or the 
order of their intelligence. God is unknown to one 
soul ; to another he can be said to be scarcely known 
at all, while a third may have a fairly clear con- 
ception concerning him. Whether the ignorance of 
the first or the very imperfect conception of the 
second, be the better state, is hard to determine. 
The soul without any conception of God is in a 
better state to receive instruction than is the soul 
with the very imperfect conception. This is always 
true. The soul with the very imperfect conception 
is certain of disappointment in the end and is there- 
fore in danger of abandoning all belief in God. The 
soul with no conception of God is open to receive the 
truth when sought. Whatever our conception of 
God may be it is far from perfect. This is true 
because man has not the power to form a perfect 
conception of God; neither hath angel, nor arch- 
angel, nor any other creature. Infinite attributes 
can be perfectly conceived only by infinite powers, 
therefore no power less than infinite can fully com- 
prehend God. When eternity shall have carried us 
far out beyond the remembrance of earth and of 
earthly existence, God will be to us as great a mys- 
tery as he is now. We shall then comprehend him 
better than we do now, and our conception of him 
shall be vastly broader than is ours now, yet we 
shall then be not perceptibly nearer to a solution of 
that mystery of God's existence, his being and his 
attributes, which now confronts the believing, the 
loving and the obedient soul. Growth towards the 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 89 

solution of this mystery and a comprehension of 
the being and the attributes of God, is the founda- 
tion of all the joy which eternity can contain for the 
soul of man. All the delights of spiritual life, of 
heaven, are incident to and dependent upon such 
growth. He who comprehends and accepts this truth 
has within it a revelation to himself of what heaven 
is and shall forever be. 



CHAPTER VI. 

DEATH.— INTELLECTUAL POWER ANTAGONISTIC TO SPIRIT- 
UAL KNOWLEDGE.— SPIRITUAL EXISTENCE. 

Death is a theme which is never pleasant to the 
living. It is something we must all meet and we 
should all seek to understand it. I purpose using 
plain language, harsh as it may seem, and to treat 
of human death simply as an effect of human life. 
Death is sad alone to the living. It is not sad for 
those who have passed through it, whatever their 
spiritual state may be. The life which is wholly 
spiritual is superior to the life which is part spir- 
itual and part physical. Death can add nothing to 
the sinner's state of willful disobedience to God, 
neither can it add anything to the saint's unfalter- 
ing obedience to God. Death does not change the 
spiritual state of the soul. For all accountable 
human beings heaven begins upon the earth, as the 
effect of the willful and loving obedience of the soul, 
or hell begins upon the earth as the effect of the 
willful disobedience of the soul. Death neither 
ushers the soul into heaven nor into hell. It has 
no effect whatever upon the soul's spiritual state. 
Death is the ending of one state or condition of 
life, but it is not the beginning of another. Death 
eliminates physical conditions and physical powers 
from the soul's life. It adds nothing to what the 
soul now possesses. It is true that the state of the 

90 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 91 

soul after death is conducive to the development of 
powers which it now possesses in an undeveloped 
condition. Deprived by death of its physical powers 
the soul turns to its spiritual powers, exerts them, 
develops them, and receives all subsequent knowl- 
edge through them. This it cannot do in human 
life because herein the physical powers are para- 
mount and hold the spiritual powers in abeyance. 
Death therefore leaves the soul with life, and with 
the vigorous use of all the powers it possessed in 
its human state, the use of which is independent of 
physical conditions. These powers are quickened 
because of the change and of the more active use 
made of them. To replace all the physical senses 
which the soul possesses in its physical state, it finds 
itself possessed of spiritual powers in an undevel- 
oped state. Such powers it proceeds to develop by 
bringing them into immediate and continuous use. 
Such use is productive of rapid development. The 
soul thus soon finds itself equipped with spiritual 
powers suited to its spiritual state and superior to 
those which perished with its physical body. 

First. Death is a change necessitated by the 
soul's dual state of existence. 

Second. Death is a law of physical existence, 
introduced with the creation of such existence and 
inseparable from it. 

Third. Death is the end of a state of existence 
which can never return to the soul. There can be 
no resurrection of the physical body. 



92 THE BOOK OF JOB 

The spiritual can alone exist without change. 
The physical is ever changing. The first proposi- 
tion I cannot prove. The second is proven by 
everything around us and by ourselves. That which 
we can see so clearly and so universally, we must 
accept as a law of physical creation. Accepting it 
as a law we must then admit that there are no 
exceptions to that law. This law of change is 
written upon everything which is physical, no mat- 
ter how ethereal or how dense is its substance. 
Change awaits all that which has form or substance 
or physical quality. Change is death, death is 
change ; the terms are synonymous. The human soul 
is endowed with the power to take up, appropriate 
and use portions of the physical creation. It takes 
them subject to this law of change, this law of death. 
The physical substance which the soul thus appro- 
priates for its uses, is changing, is dying, continu- 
ously, but it still retains the power to take up and 
appropriate other material substance to replace the 
dying matter of which it is being deprived. This 
process goes on until the period arrives when this 
power to take up and appropriate matter has run 
its course and ceases to perform its functions. The 
change goes on, and physical death is the result. 
Such is the natural course of life and the natural 
cause of death. Added to this cause are many 
others which interfere with and destroy this power 
of the soul to take up and appropriate new matter 
to replace the dying matter before appropriated. 
It follows therefore that death is simply and solely 
the passing of the soul from the matter which it 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 93 

has thus taken up and appropriated because of the 
failure of this power to longer take up and appro- 
priate new matter. Such failure may be from any 
one of almost innumerable causes. This power of 
the soul can only act through an intricate combina- 
tion of physical machinery, and whatever interferes 
with and stops any part of that machinery, destroys 
the power, and death ensues. The soul thus loses 
its hold upon matter and passes forever from the 
realm of matter into the realm of spirit. This power 
once destroyed, is forever gone. It has served the 
purpose of its creation, it has ceased to exist. 

Second. Death is a law of physical existence, 
introduced with the creation of such existence and 
inseparable from it. 

To establish this assertion is not as easy as it 
is to make it. We draw back from the fact of 
death and from the necessity which compels it. 
Death is change, change is death. If we will accept 
this assertion and remember it, we will comprehend 
more readily the thoughts which follow. The law 
of change is written upon everything material. This 
will neither be denied or doubted by anyone. It is 
so universal and so plain that it must be accepted 
by all. If we can then make it plain that change 
is death, the mystery of death disappears. Change 
means disintegration or growth. Either implies and 
embodies the term death, for growth necessitates the 
death of the old as certainly as does decay. In 
growth the new is built up out of the elements of 
the old, and the change which releases these elements 
of the old and enables the new to appropriate them 



94 THE BOOK OF JOB 

is synonymous with the term death. In growth, 
therefore, death is involved. If we can accept this 
truth we can accept the kindred truth that the 
changes necessitated by decay are also synonymous 
with death. In the assertion and the acceptance of 
these truths is laid the proper foundation for a 
study and an understanding of the death of the 
human body. The human body is neither more nor 
less than an aggregation and combination of mate- 
rial elements taken up and appropriated by that 
power of the soul to which I have referred, and 
arranged, associated and distributed as required in 
the building up of a physical body. This body be- 
comes both the abiding place and the obedient serv- 
ant of the soul. Whatever is added to that body 
from day to day is added by the exercise of the 
same powers of the soul which enabled it to assem- 
ble and combime, arrange and appropriate, the 
material elements which entered into its original 
body. We may classify all these powers under one 
head and call it the power of growth. A human 
soul is created; along with other powers, it is en- 
dowed with the power of growth. It is the office of 
this power to construct and to maintain a human 
body. It is a gift from the Creator, inseparable 
from and necessary to, the gift of human life. It 
is a power which pertains to human existence and 
not to spiritual existence. It ceases with the soul's 
physical existence the same as all other powers 
which require a material creation for their mani- 
festation and use, such as sight, hearing, tast- 
ing, smelling, feeling, and the power of producing 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 95 

sound. All these powers end with the soul's physical 
existence. Natural death is therefore nothing other 
than the decline and passing away of a tran- 
sient power of the soul, the power of growth, which 
power is bestowed upon the soul for use dur- 
ing its physical existence, and marks the pe- 
riod of such existence. A kindred power is be- 
stowed upon every form of life which is manifested 
through a material creation, whether such life be 
animal or vegetable. All created life is from God 
direct, and is of God a part, whether it be of the 
highest or of the lowest form in which life is mani- 
fested. This is not asserting that God is not also 
distinct from and superior to all created life, in his 
personality and endowments. I speak of natural 
death, for among men, as among all the forms of 
lower manifested life, there are innumerable meth- 
ods whereby this power of growth is interfered with 
and destroyed, thus producing death from what we 
would call unnatural causes. 

Third. Death is the end of a state of exist- 
ence which can never return to the soul. There 
can be no resurrection of the body. There can be 
a resurrection of a spiritual existence. There is 
such a resurrection, immediately following human 
death. This Jesus, the Christ, taught. This Jesus, 
the Christ, exemplified. He arose from a human 
death into a spiritual existence, and therein ap- 
peared unto his disciples, not in body but in spirit. 
This is a subject not properly discussed here and 
it is only referred to for the purpose of harmo- 
nizing this arugment with future assertions. The 



96 THE BOOK OF JOB 

human body goes the way of all material sub- 
stance. It changes through decay and is resolved 
into the elements from which it was drawn. It has 
served the soul as long as it could be of service to 
it, and is no more to it thereafter than is the earth 
or the water which envelops it. Death is not a dread 
monster, come to destroy. Death is a loving mes- 
senger come to unchain the fettered soul and to usher 
it out of a limited into an unlimited existence. Death 
to the human existence is birth into an unfettered 
spiritual existence. Not that this spiritual exist- 
ence was not before death a possession of the soul, 
but with fettered, limited, and undeveloped powers 
alone. 

Human intellect, or what we might call the wis- 
dom of a man, is ever warring with his own soul 
in its efforts to find its God. This is true of all 
men everywhere. It is as true of you and of me 
as it was true of Job. The less of human intellect 
we have, the less of earthly wisdom we have, the 
better it is for the soul when it comes to seek its 
God. We make this statement as a general one, 
and yet there are limitations which must go with 
it. Some degree of human intellect is necessary in 
order to constitute man a morally responsible being. 
The idiot has no moral responsibility. The less the 
intellect, the less the moral responsibility. The 
greater the intellect the greater the moral responsi- 
bility, and yet the harder is it for the soul to 
grasp the truth of God's revelation of himself, and 
to come into a conscious knowledge of God's exist- 
ence. This is the reason for our assertion that the 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 97 

intellect of a man wars against his own soul in its 
efforts to find its God. In proof of the assertion 
we present the following thoughts: 

First. Our own experience and our own obser- 
vation are in line with this assertion. 

Second. Intellect is masterful in its character 
and is not submissive. It dominates but will not 
serve. 

Third. Intellect takes from the soul that feel- 
ing of dependence which is essential to a proper and 
a successful search after God. 

First. As to our own experience and our own 
observation. The most ignorant are the most de- 
vout, where they seek obedience at all. This is true 
the world over, and there are perhaps few of us 
who have not observed it as a truth. No questions 
of doubt disturb them. They accept the figures by 
and through which the revelations of truth are given 
to man, as the literal truth itself, and are satisfied 
therewith. They possess a certainty of knowledge 
which no man of broader intellectual power can ever 
hope to possess during earthly existence. Doubt is 
the origin of all sin, therefore having no doubt, they 
do not sin. They may do many things which they 
of broader intellect could not do without sin, but to 
them it is not sin, because no purpose of disobedi- 
ence accompanies the act. Spiritually considered, 
ignorance is bliss. Ignorance is a temporary gain 
to the soul. But from this we must not argue that 
intellectual efforts should be suppressed, discouraged, 
or even lessened. Intellect is a necessity to human 



98 THE BOOK OF JOB 

life and to human development in earth. Intellect 
is the crown which raises man above the brute and 
which makes him a morally responsible creature. 
Without it man would be a brute, with it he may 
enter heaven. The assertion and the argument are 
that while intellect is a necessity to man's continued 
existence upon the earth, and its possession in some 
degree a necessity to his moral accountability, yet 
the possession of it is a hindrance to the acquisi- 
tion of spiritual knowledge through the exercise of 
the spiritual powers of the soul, and such hindrance 
is in direct ratio to the development of the intel- 
lectual powers. The two classes of powers are an- 
tagonistic. The one can comprehend and accept 
nothing which is not material. The other can know 
nothing which is material. 

This brings us to our second assertion, That 
intellect is masterful in its character and not sub- 
missive; it dominates, but will not serve. If this 
was not true, the intellectual powers could not serve 
the purpose of their creation. Their office is to 
dominate matter; to bring it under subjection to 
man; to discover its laws and to apply these laws 
for the benefit of man. This intellect has done for 
man and is doing for him, to a degree which causes 
those of this age to marvel at its power. This can- 
not be said of the soul's spiritual powers. They can 
take cognizance alone of the truths which pertain 
unto the spiritual world. The world of matter is 
unknown to the world of spirit, therefore the soul's 
spiritual powers can comprehend nothing material, 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 99 

any more than the soul's intellectual powers can com- 
prehend truths wholly spiritual. 

Third. Intellect takes from the soul that feeling 
of dependence which is essential to a proper and 
successful search after God. The soul which feels no 
dependence upon God can never find him. Depend- 
ence upon him and a yearning after him are essen- 
tial to the acceptance by the soul of the spiritual 
truth that God exists. The acceptance of this spir- 
itual truth is the foundation of our relationship with 
him as redeemed children, through Christ, our 
Saviour. The soul may accept the intellectual truth 
that there is a God, but the acceptance of such in- 
tellectual truth cannot become the foundation of any 
new relationship with God. Intellectual truth can- 
not support a spiritual relation. The world is full 
of effort along this line and all such effort is in 
vain. Spiritual truth can alone be received through 
the soul's spiritual powers. Spiritual truth cannot 
be received through the soul's intellectual powers. 
It is probably for this reason that when the intellect 
is great and the intellectual powers strongly dom- 
inant over the spiritual powers, that a feeling of 
independence and self-sufficiency is produced, which 
greatly hinders, or may be entirely bars, a successful 
search after the spiritual knowledge of our Creator's 
existence. There is a vast difference between seek- 
ing to know God intellectually, and seeking to know 
him spiritually. The soul may accept the truth that 
there is a God, through the knowledge which comes 
to it by the use of some one or more of its five 
physical senses. Such acceptance is intellectual 



100 THE BOOK OF JOB 

only and does not bring the soul into any new rela- 
tionship with God. God must be revealed to the 
soul spiritually before it does or can enter into a 
new relationship. What is a spiritual acceptance 
of the truth of God's existence? It is neither more 
nor less than a knowledge of God's existence be- 
stowed upon the soul through its own spiritual 
powers. Such knowledge comes now to the soul of 
man by one means only, and that is through an 
acceptance of the revelation of the Father's life 
which Christ the Son makes by and within himself 
and his own earthly life. 

Prior to the coming of Christ it was possible for 
the soul of man to know its God, spiritually, through 
the exercise of its spiritual powers direct, and by 
the aid of such revelation as the soul then pos- 
sessed within itself. The intellectual power had not 
then so far dominated and weakened the spiritual 
as to render this impossible, as it has since done. 
With the coming of Christ came the last revelation 
of God to man. The spiritual powers of man had 
then dwindled to their lowest degree of strength 
and the intellectual powers had become dominant. 
This constituted the fullness of time in which Christ 
should appear among men. Of his coming and of 
his nature the intellectual powers of man had no 
conception. He reached his disciples alone through 
their spiritual powers. The intellectual powers of 
man crucified him; the spiritual powers of man ac- 
cepted him. This was true in his day and it is as 
true in our day as it was in his day. Intellect does 
crucify Christ and will crucify him to the end of 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 101 

time. The soul's spiritual powers do now accept 
him and will accept him to the end of time, when- 
ever the soul itself seeks obedience, worship and 
knowledge through these powers. This it will not 
and cannot do while possessing that feeling of inde- 
pendence and self-sufficiency which is engendered of 
intellectual power. 

Earthly life is a gracious gift from God to those 
who rightly use it, but spiritual existence is as rest 
from labor; as the peace of sleep to the anxious 
worry of waking hours, when compared therewith. 
What, then, is spiritual existence? Spiritual exist- 
ence is a truth, a reality, a fact. This it is for 
each and all upon whom the gift of human life is 
bestowed. None others do possess it, none others 
can possess it. Spiritual existence is an outgrowth 
of, an effect of, a complement of, earthly existence. 
It can come in no other way than through and because 
of a physical existence. Hence spiritual existence is 
limited to those who have possessed, who now possess 
or who shall hereafter possess, a physical existence. I 
speak now of spiritual existence in its proper and 
distinctive character. It is true that man is taught 
that God and all his creatures higher than man, exist 
as spirits, but this is beacuse man can comprehend no 
higher existence than his own spiritual existence. 
For this reason that term is broadened so as to 
include all higher, although distinct, states of exist- 
ence. When the term is used to include and cover 
all life which is freed from or is superior to a 
physical existpnce, it conveys one meaning which I 
claim is not its proper meaning. When it is used 



102 THE BOOK OF JOB 

to designate the life of man freed from its physical 
associations it expresses another meaning which I 
claim is its proper signification. Man 's life after 
death is spiritual existence. It is not the same as 
the life of angel or of archangel; it is not the same 
as the life of God the Father, although it is the same 
as the life of Jesus Christ the Son, because through a 
human existence he entered into the spiritual exist- 
ence. Hence we will be like Jesus in the quality of 
our life, if we enter into that state of spiritual ex- 
istence designated spiritual life, in which state alone 
we can have the power to know him. Spiritual 
existence, therefore, I define as that quality of life 
which is bestowed upon the human creature and 
which is everlasting. It begins with the creation 
of the soul and it never ends. Earthly existence I 
likewise define as being that associated quality of 
life which is bestowed upon the soul at its creation 
and ends with its human death. Spiritual existence 
and earthly existence are blended into one, while 
the soul remains in this material world. Death ends 
the latter and makes of the former the supreme 
quality of life. Spiritual existence either before or 
after human death is divided into two states, the 
one called spiritual life, the other spiritual death. 
If you will bear these several and distinct assertions 
in mind you will be prepared for the thoughts which 
follow. Spiritual existence and spiritual life must 
not be confounded. We all have the former; some 
only enter into the latter. Those who do not enter 
into spiritual life do enter into spiritual death, which 
is the opposite state in spiritual existence. Spiritual 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 103 

existence is therefore for all of us a continuation 
of our present existence in part. We drop the ma- 
terial and continue the spiritual of that which we 
now are. In the main our lives remain unchanged. 
We fall into a sleep as to seeing, hearing, smell- 
ing, tasting and feeling. We continue ourselves in 
other respects. We know that we exist and that we 
exert our individual powers. We are conscious of 
all our thoughts, and this constitutes life in its es- 
sence. Earthly life itself might well be denned to 
be, the possession of the power to think, and the 
consciousness of our thoughts. While this is neither 
a complete nor even a full definition of earthly ex- 
istence it is both a complete and a full definition 
of spiritual existence. Spiritual existence is not and 
never can be more to us than the power to think 
and the consciousness of our thoughts. Let me illus- 
trate. Some human beings are deaf and dumb, and 
yet they possess human existence in its fullest sense, 
lacking only these two powers. Others may be both 
blind and deaf and dumb and of them the same 
must be said, lacking only the three powers. Now 
we will imagine a human being still in human exist- 
ence who is blind, and deaf, who has lost the sense 
of smell, the sense of taste and the sense of feeling; 
such person would still possess human existence in 
all its fullness save as to these five senses or powers. 
It would be impossible for such an one to know 
matter, because it would be impossible for anything 
material to act upon any power or sense which 
would convey an impression to the soul. Such an 
one would be wholly dead to the material world, 



104 THE BOOK OF JOB 

although still possessing existence in such world. 
Such an one would know no change when real phys- 
ical death came to him. Practically he died when 
the last physical sense connecting his soul with the 
physical world failed him. Thereafter death was 
powerless to produce any further change or experi- 
ence of which his soul could take cognizance. It 
appears to me that the foregoing is a plain declara- 
tion of a truth, which is justified by our experience 
or observation; therefore, my assertion that this is 
all that there is of death may seem neither strange 
nor startling. 

Let us turn to that existence which follows such 
death. In tfhe light of what I have declared to be 
the truth, let us approach death and our after expe- 
rience. Follow me, as I follow those who have 
gone before, through an experience which must be 
ours in reality when God wills, but which now 
must be an experience in anticipation. The hold 
of the soul upon its physical organization is loosen- 
ing. Long association with the body and long con- 
trol over the body, makes the soul tenacious of its 
control. It is conscious of relaxation of vital physi- 
cal power. Its power of thought, and the conscious- 
ness of the existence of that power remain un- 
changed. It knows that dissolution is approaching. 
It from the spiritual side of life marks the loss of 
one physical sense, probably sight. It is shut out 
on the physical side of life from light and all is 
dark to it. Its remaining physical senses are grow- 
ing dull. The minor ones of taste and smell de- 
part. Hearing and sensation, or feeling, remain, 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 105 

with possibly the power of speech, each with waver- 
ing and decreasing force. Muscular control is gone, 
and with it speech fails. Hearing and feeling re- 
main, as the only channels through which the soul 
can know an earthly existence. Hearing fails, and 
the silence of eternity begins. Now the soul can 
yet know that there is a physical world through one 
channel alone, feeling or sensation. Sensation goes, 
and the body is dead to the soul, although life may 
yet be within that body, for the unconscious con- 
trol of the soul over the body may continue for an 
indefinite period thereafter. This is a state of 
wholly unconscious physical life, which ordinarily 
ends quickly. The soul is now freed from its body 
and has lost all control over it and all knowledge 
of it save that which comes through memory. It 
remains a thinking being, conscious of its power to 
think and of its exercise of that power. It knows 
nothing and can know nothing of the physical world 
because there remains no channel connecting it there- 
with and through which knowledge of the physical 
world may reach it. We know nothing of the physi- 
cal world save through those senses which connect 
our souls therewith and carry knowledge thereof to 
us. These have perished, one and all. The soul is 
in eternity. Out of eternity it entered into time; 
through time it re-enters eternity, thereafter to re- 
main forever a self-conscious, thinking power, a 
spark from the eternal life of the infinite Father. 
That spark existed as a part of the Father's life, 
without beginning. That spark was separated from 
the Father's life, in so far as to give it individuality, 



106 THE BOOK OF JOB 

through its human creation, and that individuality 
once bestowed, can never be taken from it. All cre- 
ated life is of God a part, but all of created life is 
not God, for God is more than all, and is above all 
that springs from him. 

This individual spark from God, this soul which 
has lived upon the earth and has died, is in eternity. 
It has knowledge of earth through its memory of its 
experiences while upon the earth, otherwise it can 
have no knowledge of any physical creation any- 
where. Its world is now a world of spirit. Its 
existence is now spiritual and wholly spiritual. It 
finds itself shorn of all which connected it with the 
physical creation upon the earth and of all those 
powers which pertain to earthly life alone. What 
is there for it in eternity ? Nothing of form ; nothing 
of color; nothing of sound; nothing that we call 
real. What then are its possessions? An existence 
unreal, when measured by the thoughts of earth, in 
which its powers of thought remain unchanged. To 
it clings a memory of earth, which will gradually 
fade away, just as the memory of early childhood 
faded from its later life in earth, so that in its 
future existence that cycle approaches wherein it 
shall remember nothing of its own beginning, nor 
of its earthly existence, even as now it remembers 
nothing of its own infancy or of its first conscious- 
ness of individual existence. To this extent, and 
to this extent . only, will the soul in its spiritual 
and everlasting existence be merged back and lost 
in the infinite life of its Father, God. Individuality 
of being is forever assured to it, but knowledge of 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 107 

its own beginning can never be bestowed npon it. 
Snch knowledge belongs alone to infinite powers. 

When the soul thus finds itself in eternity, it 
does not rest. Cut off from the use and benefit of 
its earthly powers it longs for others to replace them. 
It has them, but they are undeveloped, just as in 
its earthly infancy it had some powers pertaining 
to its earth life which were undeveloped. The 
power of speech is given because speech is depend- 
ent upon matter and the soul's control of it, both 
of which are now lost to it. Language is a human 
device and ends with death. To make good this 
loss the soul first finds that it possesses the power 
to communicate its thoughts to others and to re- 
ceive the thoughts of others, without the use of 
sound, speech or language. 

This power it uses, feebly at first, as the earthly 
infant learns first to prattle. This is a power we 
may know that the soul possesses because it is a 
spiritual power which may be developed and used 
in human life, and in very truth is the power by 
and through which these words are written. It is 
a power which every created soul possesses. It is 
a power which few can develop upon earth, and 
which no one should seek to develop. It belongs to 
spiritual existence and to that existence alone. It 
is foreign to all that pertains to earth, and is for- 
bidden of God to man in his human estate, save as 
he both wills and compels its use. None ever so 
use it except they be first tried of God and com- 
pelled of him as a choice between such use and 
their own spiritual death. When thus used by 



108 THE BOOK OF JOB 

them it is under and by reason of a law revealed 
to them alone through experience and inexplicable 
without the experience. This wonderful power of 
thought transference, without media of sound or lan- 
guage, or word or figure, becomes the compensation 
to the soul for its loss of earthly physical powers 
and senses. It is the language of spiritual exist- 
ence, the music of spiritual existence, the beauty of 
spiritual existence, the grandeur of spiritual ex- 
istence, limited as it is alone by the power of the 
soul to think. Whatever my thoughts may be, to 
the limit of my power to think, at will, I give 
them to another. Whatever the thoughts of that 
other, at the other's will, and to the limit of my 
power to receive, I have them. Is this a loss com- 
pared with earthly limitations ? 

This much of spiritual existence belongs to every 
soul. None can have less, some will have more. 
From this point a new life arises for those to whom 
it is given. It is the development of those spiritual 
powers through which God is recognized and is known. 
The development of these powers should begin in 
earth-life, and does so begin whenever obedience is 
sought therein. It is the few who thus seek obedi- 
ence. It is the many who willfully disobey. Such 
development is begun with the first effort to obey, 
and if such efforts are not made in human life, 
opportunity having been therein given, they never 
will be made. No human soul to which such oppor- 
tunity has been given in human life, and which 
has not therein chosen obedience, can ever make such 
choice in that existence which follows death. The 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 109 

reason therefor is, not that God would there refuse 
to receive and forgive, for that could never be, but 
because such soul by its choice of disobedience, and 
by its act of disobedience, in accordance with such 
choice, has destroyed forever those spiritual powers 
by and through which alone it is possible for it to 
know God. If in our human life we should by our 
own choice and by our own act destroy our power 
of physical vision by destroying the organs of sight, 
we could never thereafter see. Spiritually my as- 
sertion is the same. By our own act of disobedi- 
ence, coupled with a purpose to disobey, we destroy 
forever our spiritual power to know God as com- 
pletely and as permanently as we would destroy 
vision by a voluntary destruction of our organs of 
vision. One such act, associated with such purpose, 
is all that is required to do this, and most cer- 
tainly and positively does do it. There is no repent- 
ance for such sin. There is no forgiveness for such 
sin, for the reason that the soul thus sinning will 
never thereafter know repentance or seek forgive- 
ness; both are impossible to it. This choice is made 
in human life if the opportunity therefor comes to 
the soul therein. If no opportunity for such choice 
comes to it in its human life, it will come to it in 
its spiritual existence, and such choice will then be 
made. Heaven is entered through but one door, 
and that door is the choice of the soul of obedi- 
ence to the will of God as revealed to us by and 
through Christ, the Son. Heaven contains no soul 
which has not of its own free will made this choice, 
and followed such choice by obedience. Therefore 



110 THE BOOK OF JOB 

I say that the soul that has thus chosen obedience 
in its human life, in addition to this power of 
thought transference, will find itself possessed of an 
incipient development of the spiritual power to know 
God, which includes the spiritual powers of obedi- 
ence and worship. I call these spiritual powers. It 
is not easy to conceive of them as powers, or to 
express in words the thoughts which represent them. 
It is true that one soul knows God, knows that God 
exists, knows that God loves him, knows that God 
speaks to him, knows that he is at peace with God 
and that he is approved of God; knows that Christ 
is the divine Son of the infinite Father, knows that 
Christ is spiritually with him, revealing to him the 
life and the will of the Father. The soul may know 
all this, even in earth-life. It may also worship God 
and Christ, the divine Son, its Saviour, and be con- 
scious that it does thus worship. The soul may also 
obey God, doing God's will as revealed to it, in 
preference to its own will, whenever the two would 
otherwise conflict; thus ever making God's revealed 
will first and its own will second, or in other words, 
making free choice to do God's will. Of such 
knowledge, of such worship, of such obedience, the 
soul is conscious. How does it receive or come into 
this consciousness? Just as it receives and comes 
into all other consciousness, through the exercise or 
use of a power. Consciousness cannot come to the 
soul in any other way. Therefore I use the terms, 
power to know God, power to worship God, power to 
obey God, and thus used the terms are as accurate 
as to speak of the power to hear or know sound. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 111 

When this choice of the soul, made in human 
life if its opportunity was then presented, and made 
in its spiritual existence if no such opportunity was 
presented during its human life, is disobedience and 
its act is according to its choice, then by such choice 
and act it destroys forever these undeveloped spir- 
itual powers, and its spiritual existence continues 
thereafter with this one spiritual power of thought 
transference, as the only power remaining to it for 
development. I say only power, because in my judg- 
ment human comprehension of the spiritual exist- 
ence can go no farther than to conceive of and in 
a measure comprehend these four purely spiritual 
powers which I have named. To say that these 
four channels are the only channels through which 
knowledge may come to the soul during its endless 
spiritual existence would neither be justifiable nor 
reasonable; but to say that they are the only 
sources of knowledge which the human mind can now 
comprehend, is both justifiable and reasonable. I do 
not here seek to trace the effect of the development 
of these four powers by the soul, in the one case, 
and of the loss of the three powers, in the other case. 
That has already been done in part and must again 
be dwelt upon at length. 

The human life of man passeth into the spiritual 
life of the soul through its separation from all ma- 
terial existence and such are some of the changes 
which come over it. Such is the rest of the dead 
from the labors of human existence. Such is the 
sleep of death, whether it be in the dust of the 
grave, in the bottom of the sea, or in the ashes 



112 THE BOOK OF JOB 

and the gases of the flame. It is the soul's 
sleep to all that is material; a sleep that shall know 
no waking forever. It is sleep only as to things 
material; it never can be sleep as to things spir- 
itual. 



CHAPTER VII. 

ZOPHAR, JOB'S THIRD FRIEND. — THE LAW BY WHICH 

ALONE THE SOUL CAN KNOW ITS CREATOR.— 

PANTHEISM. 

The trial of the soul must come to it. It can- 
not be escaped. 

In his weakness Job would have escaped account- 
able human existence and would have chosen to have 
passed from birth through death into spiritual ex- 
istence. It was his uninstructed thought that led 
him to believe that he would have thus escaped the 
trial of his soul through which he was then passing. 
Is not this phase of Job's character and belief often 
repeated upon the earth? Have we ever in our 
weakness and in our sufferinig wished, like Job, that 
we might have died in our infancy and thus have 
escaped the sore trials of this life? If we have, 
then let us hear the words of Zophar. This third 
friend of Job is the third spiritual stage of man's 
progress in human life. To explain, we must am- 
plify this thought. By spiritual stage we mean 
period of development. Man's life in earth is 
divided into three periods or stages of development. 

First. The imbecility of infancy and childhood. 

Second. The self-confidence, boldness, inde- 
pendence and stubbornness of early life. 

113 



114 THE BOOK OF JOB 

Third. The spirit of wisdom, circumspection and 
investigation, which comes with matured years. 

Each of these three stages carries with it a dif- 
ferent spirit. The first, a spirit of helplessness and 
dependence ; the second a spirit of independence, self- 
sufficiency and self-will; the third a spirit of in- 
vestigation, willingness to be taught, and of defer- 
ence to greater wisdom. This third state and the 
spirit which accompanies it, were Job's at the period 
of his sore affliction, and this state and spirit spake 
to him in the words of Zophar. It is therefore 
proper to say, that in this allegorical presentation 
of truth, Zophar stands for the matured human 
state of the soul, intellectually and spiritually. Job 's 
own soul, therefore, spake unto itself the words of 
Zophar. The book of Job is an allegorical presenta- 
tion of truth as it comes to each and every one who 
suffers affliction and seeks these truths concerning 
it. Such soul turns to its God because it believes 
in God, and this belief in God, is its first friend 
and comforter. In such belief it speaks to itself 
in the words of Eliphaz. Having this first friend, 
such soul must have the thought and must accept 
the truth, that God's wisdom is infinite. 

With the acceptance of this truth, comes to it 
the words of Bildad. Having these two friends, the 
spirit of its maturer years and riper development, 
both intellectually and spiritually, speaks to it in 
the words of Zophar. Job sought God and could 
not find him. Forward and backward, to the right 
and to the left, God was hidden from him. This is 
true of all men everywhere, and shall be forever 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 115 

true. Neither man, nor angel, nor arch-angel, nor 
cherub, nor seraph, can be said to know God, in the 
sense of comprehending him. God is known to all 
his creatures according to one and the same law, 
which law is both changeless and everlasting. Can 
we find that law? Can we comprehend it? Can 
we declare it? This is what we now aim to do, 
according to the limited powers of our human en- 
dowment. In doing this we will outline the course 
of thought to be followed under the following heads, 
which will guide us in this search after this law, in 
our efforts to comprehend it, and in the declaration 
of it. 

First. God's life is not the life of any created 
being. 

Second. Our comprehension of life depends 
upon our possession of the life comprehended, in 
whole or in part, and the degree of such compre- 
hension depends upon the degree in which we pos- 
sess the comprehended life. 

Third. The measure of God's life which we have 
within our own being is dependent upon our own 
efforts. 

Fourth. A full comprehension of God would 
mean the possession of all the life which he pos- 
sesses; to be what he is, in all his infinite attributes. 
This being impossible for any created being sustains 
the assertion that no creature can ever fully com- 
prehend and know God, no matter what the quality 
or plane of its created life may be. 



116 THE BOOK OF JOB 

The foregoing must be considered in our effort 
to find the law. In our effort to comprehend the 
law we must further consider the following: 

Fifth. The low estate and endowment of man, 
and the aids necessitated thereby. 

Sixth. The missing power in those who have 
destroyed it and the growing power in those who 
have cultivated it. 

Seventh. The human plane of life and the ma- 
terial existence which limits the thought of man. 

Thereafter in our efforts to declare this law we 
must consider: 

Eighth. The spiritual nature of human life 
and the imperfect action of its powers during 
earthly existence. 

Ninth. The inferiority of the soul's spiritual 
powers, when at their fullest in spiritual existence. 

Tenth. The impossibility of aiding any of these 
powers by any material figure, either here or here- 
after. 

Then in conclusion our thoughts must turn to 
God. What is he ? What may we ever know of him ? 

First. Life we have heretofore defined to be a 
manifestation of individual existence. This is a brief 
yet comprehensive definition of life, in whatsoever 
plane or degree of existence it may be found. Life 
may be more than this, but it cannot be less than 
this. Life which falls below this is oblivion. Life 
may exist in oblivion, but it is not manifested life, 
hence it is not included in the term, life, as we ordi- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 117 

narily use it. Such life we have treated of elsewhere 
and it has no connection with the present inquiry. 
Life as we are now considering it is that which can 
and must forever manifest itself in some plane or 
degree of existence. Such life begins with the life 
of God, which in itself has ever been without begin- 
ning, and ends with the life of man, which has be- 
ginning but shall never end. Man's life is the lowest 
which escapes oblivion. God's life is above all created 
life. Between these two there is an incomprehensible 
span which is subdivided into degrees or planes of 
existence, unknown to man, save through that revela- 
tion thereof which God has given to him. While 
we must forever remain in ignorance of all these 
higher states or planes of individual life, we may 
know that they exist by a double assurance of such 
knowledge. First, by the direct word of inspired 
revelation; second, by that knowledge of the law 
of life which is both revealed to us by divine revela- 
tion and is declared unto us by our own life and 
by that life which is yet beneath our own. The fact 
of life may be an empty meaningless truth to the 
thoughtless ; it cannot be so to the thoughtful. Which 
of us has even answered to his own satisfaction the 
inquiries which at some period come to all of us, 
What is life? Whence does it come? What is its 
destiny? Life is for us the one problem which goes 
back of birth, fills the present, and reaches out be- 
yond death into and through eternity. It is the 
problem of the ages, unsolved and unsolvable. In 
this much is our life like the life of God. This 
likeness is independent of the moral and the spirit- 



118 THE BOOK OF JOB 

ual qualities of the soul. Through these another 
and a distinct likeness unto the life of God may- 
become implanted in our souls, and it is this latter 
likeness of which we shall speak principally in this 
argument. God's life is something which lies so far 
above the possible conception of our finite powers 
that it is impossible that we should comprehend it. 
Its character of being eternal, without beginning, 
is itself incomprehensible to the mind of man. 
Finite mind staggers under the weight of this thought, 
and whatever its strength may be, in such contem- 
plation it reaches the point where it must fall help- 
less in its search after a beginning. That which 
is true of this thought is likewise true of all the 
infinite attributes of God. God's life is manifested 
only by and through these attributes. We can know 
that he exists in no other way than through our 
consciousness that he exercises these attributes to- 
wards us. This consciousness is the knowledge of 
God's existence which we now possess, and is the 
same in kind, of all the knowledge of his existence 
which we can ever possess. It is the same in kind 
as all the knowledge all creatures, however high their 
degree or plane of life may be, can ever possess. 
We can safely assert this when we once know that 
this is the. law by which we as creatures can alone 
know our Creator, for the laws of God are both 
universal in their application and are changeless in 
their essence or nature. Experience in our own 
human lives teaches us that this is the law by which 
alone we may know God. At least our experience 
teaches us this when we can rightly read and apply 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 119 

such experience. Revelation contains the same truth 
in manifold forms of declaration. Experience and 
revelation must go hand in hand in leading the soul 
into the acceptance of this truth. The life of God 
is therefore an incomprehensible life, above and be- 
yond all states or degrees of created life. 

Second. We cannot comprehend any life of 
which we possess no part. I believe this truth is 
apparent to but few of us. We believe that we 
can comprehend anything that we can think of. 
Such is the natural conceit of the human intellectual 
nature. It is however a truth that we can think 
of many things that we cannot comprehend. I will 
illustrate this thought in this way. The thought 
of eternity is one which we cannot possibly com- 
prehend. Eternity is neither more nor less than 
time infinitely extended backwards and infinitely 
extended forwards from the present instant. These 
thoughts as we have seen stagger and finally over- 
power the strongest human intellects in an effort 
to compass them. Time is a subdivision of eternity 
bounded by a beginning and limited by an end. 
Human intellect can comprehend time because, first, 
it is finite, having limits, and second, we have ex- 
perienced it in our own lives. By these two truths 
we are enabled to comprehend time. We can com- 
prehend eternity in part, because we have experi- 
enced it in part in our own lives. The time which 
we experience in our lives, being a part of eternity, 
enables us to assert that we have experienced, have 
possessed, and have known a part of eternity, and 
by the measure of this experience we may know and 



120 THE BOOK OF JOB 

comprehend eternity. I apply the same reasoning 
to a knowledge of God's life which I have applied 
to a knowledge of eternity. That life as a whole 
is incomprehensible to us, but in our own lives we 
have experienced a part of God's life. We who 
accept the truth of God's existence know that he 
has given us life; that it is "in him that we live 
and move and have our being;" and the conscious- 
ness of these truths gives to us the assurance that 
in the mere fact of our own life is revealed to us 
the truth of God's life. Whatever more God's life 
may be we may know that it is all that our life is. 
Therefore as our experience of time leads us into a 
partial comprehension of eternity, so do our pos- 
session and experience of life lead us into a partial 
comprehension of God's life. This is true of our 
lives in the broadest sense, without reference to the 
moral nature of the soul and the moral qualities of 
our lives. This much of God's life is revealed to 
every human creature who seeks to know and to 
understand that revelation. Without this revela- 
tion no soul could find or know its God, because it 
could not otherwise comprehend anything concern- 
ing the life of God. This is not all that may be 
revealed to us of God's life through our own lives, 
for we assert the truth to be that the measure of our 
knowledge of God's life is dependent upon the meas- 
ure or degree to which his life becomes a part of 
our own lives. As God's life is revealed to us by 
the possession in our own lives of a part of his life 
so likewise are his attributes revealed to us by the 
possession in our own lives of a part of these at- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 121 

tributes. If God's love becomes a part of our own 
natures then the possession of that love in our own 
lives reveals to us the existence of this attribute 
of God's character. Our own spiritual understand- 
ing in like manner reveals God's infinite wisdom. 
Our own puny powers in like manner reveal God's 
infinite power. Here the revelation ends, for the 
baser passions, inclinations and desires revealed to 
us in our own lives cannot possibly exist with infinite 
power, infinite wisdom and infinite love, as a part 
of one and the same character; hence these do not 
reveal to us any part of God's life. 

Third. The measure of God's life embodied in 
our own lives, and the measure of the revelation 
of God's life to us thereby, are dependent upon our 
own efforts. This truth lies at the foundation of 
all spiritual understanding. It is the secret of all 
spiritual knowledge. God is the essence and the all 
of spiritual understanding and of spiritual knowl- 
edge. There is no spiritual understanding or spirit- 
ual knowledge which can come to the soul outside 
of or distinct from a knowledge of God. This is 
true of all spiritual existence ana of all existence 
which is superhuman or superspiritual. God in his 
infinite existence and with his infinite attributes be- 
comes the sole subject for thought and the sole 
source of knowledge, above and beyond the material 
plane of man's present existence. There can be 
nothing else for the soul to grasp or to grapple with. 
Knowledge and understanding alone come through 
self-exertion. This we know from experience. Sup- 
pose we have nothing and know nothing concerning 



322 THE BOOK OF JOB 

which we may exert ourselves, what follows? A 
blank existence, with all which that term implies. 
Such an existence is impossible in this material 
world save only to the idiot and to such others as 
might possibly exist without one single physical 
sense or power to connect their souls with the material 
creation. Such a case is supposable and I have 
used it as an illustration of what human death is. 
I may now use it as an illustration of what spiritual 
death will be for all who enter it. In the supposed 
case the soul through the death of all of its physical 
senses and powers is rendered wholly and forever 
unconscious of the existence of a material world, 
although it still exists in such world. All the avenues 
through which the soul can take cognizance of the 
existence of such world have been cut off. That 
world still exists and the soul still exists in that 
world but without any knowledge thereof. So like- 
wise the soul which by its own choice and act of 
willful disobedience has destroyed all the spiritual 
powers which it possessed, by and through which 
alone it might have known God, must thereafter live 
in precisely the same relation to the kingdom of God, 
whether it be in this world or in the world to come, 
as the soul in the illustration, sustains to the ma- 
terial kingdom. Again, take the soul in the illus- 
tration and consider what are the possibilities of 
its acquiring that knowledge which rests upon and 
is declared by the physical creation. It has no chance 
whatever ; its life is a blank, in so far as such knowl- 
edge is concerned. If one physical sense or power, 
one avenue from the physical world to the soul re- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 123 

mains open, then it may obtain some knowledge 
thereof. With all closed it can obtain no such knowl- 
edge. The soul in the illustration may still have 
its spiritual powers as God bestowed them, and may 
through them be enabled to reach out after and to 
know God. If it does this its life is not a blank, 
but is great and beautiful and satisfying just in 
proportion to the knowledge of God which it shall 
acquire. The degree of such knowledge is dependent 
upon the earnestness and the continuity of the ef- 
fort to acquire it. Herein lies the all of heavenly 
joy. It is the joy of the knowledge which the soul 
has acquired of God its Creator. This knowledge 
and this joy are the direct result of its own efforts 
and are in direct proportion to the strength and the 
persistency of such efforts. 

Fourth. We have asserted that we can only 
know a life which we possess in whole or in part and 
that our knowledge of such life is governed by the 
degree in which we possess it. This is a truth which 
can be established from our own human experience. 
We possess human life and we know such life as fully 
as our powers of comprehension will permit. We 
also possess spiritual life, but only in part, and our 
consciousness of our possession of it is not constant. 
Such consciousness may and often does become 
strong by growth. It may also become weak by our 
own abuse of it. We know our own spiritual ex- 
istence only to the degree in which we are conscious 
of its possession. To know this existence fully we 
would have to possess it in all its untrameled full- 
ness. This can only be after death shall have freed 



124 THE BOOK OF JOB 

us from our present dual existence. Here then are 
two distinct planes or states of existence in which 
our own experience teaches us the foregoing truth. 
Upon this we may safely base the law and the declar- 
ation above stated. God's existence is an infinitely 
higher existence than is our own spiritual ex- 
istence. He has, however, bestowed upon us the 
power to experience in some slight degree a portion 
of his own existence. It is possible that we should 
know something of God's love, appropriating that 
something ourselves and making it a part of our 
own Jove towards our fellow men. In doing this we 
know something of God's life, that is, to the extent to 
which we thus appropriate his love and make it a part 
of our own lives. It is this one infinite attribute of 
God's life that we may know the most fully, because 
this attribute has been the most fully declared and 
revealed to us, through Jesus Christ the Son. We 
may, however, know something of God's infinite 
power as Christ revealed and used and exemplified 
that power; neither is it going beyond the words 
of Christ himself to say that we his children may 
in some measure use and exemplify that power also. 
The same in every respect is true of God's attri- 
bute of infinite wisdom. It even may be exemplified 
through his human children, if they be found wor- 
thy. All that is revealed to us of God's life is that 
he is a Being of infinite power, infinite wisdom and 
infinite love. What other attributes he possesses we 
have no power to know, and these three revealed attri- 
butes we can only know to the limit and extent that 
we make them a part of our own lives. It is thus, and 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 125 

tlras alone, that we may know God in earth. It is thus 
and thus alone, that we will know God in heaven. 

We have thus found the law, by which, and by 
which alone, it is possible for us to know God, and 
we will next consider whether we can comprehend 
the law. 

Fifth. In doing this we must consider the low 
estate of man's endowments and the aids that are 
necessitated thereby. It is with difficulty that man 
comprehends anything that is spiritual. His phys- 
ical endowment is so positive in its expression and 
so intense in realization through self-conscious ex- 
periences, that it casts the shadow of a never ceas- 
ing doubt over all spiritual consciousness and experi- 
ence. This is a necessity to the perpetuation of the 
human race upon the earth. Remove from the mind 
of man this indistinctness of spiritual experience 
and this uncertainty as to his own spiritual nature 
and powers, and you invite self-destruction with- 
out any restraint other than the moral law. This 
alone would be insufficient. The spiritual state of 
the soul is so vastly superior to the physical state 
that were its truths and its powers consciously 
realized in earth, the soul's choice would be human 
death, and where such choice exists the way to gratify 
it will be found. Infinite wisdom has provided 
that man's spiritual nature in his human state should 
be shadowy, uncertain, and only consciously pos- 
sessed through the personal efforts of the soul in the 
development of such spiritual powers as will deter 
it from the self-destruction of its earthly life. There 
is but one exception to this declaration. One spirit- 



126 THE BOOK OF JOB 

ual power, which, is wholly free from any moral 
quality, may be imperfectly experienced in human 
life. This is the power of thought transference, or 
the power of a soul in the body to exchange thought 
with a soul out of the body. What this power is, 
but few really understand. Whether they under- 
stand it or not, all who do use it know that it is 
the most unsatisfactory, uncertain, irresponsible and 
unreliable of all the powers that the soul has ever 
experienced or used. This is true whenever and 
wherever it is used by and between those who do 
not themselves comprehend or recognize the law 
which governs its use. For all such it is a Tower of 
Babel, experienced as a reality in their own lives. 
It is founded in error and builded in disobedience, 
either purposed or unknown, and will result in 
naught. This truth without explanation is not clear. 
Explanation would be meaningless to those who lack 
the experience necessary to apply it. It would not 
be accepted by those who have the experience. I 
therefore leave it as a truth asserted but not estab- 
lished. 

With this low endowment and this uncertainty 
in the use of this the only spiritual power possible 
to him, other than those imposing and enforcing 
moral obligations by and through their very devel- 
opment, it is impossible that the soul of man should 
acquire spiritual understanding without material 
aids. Man, until he has experienced spiritual life, 
cannot know spiritual life; therefore he must be 
taught spiritual truths in the figures and terms of 
physical life. It is for this reason that God is re- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 127 

ferred to as a person, with bodily form and parts, 
possessing a likeness to human passions and powers; 
that heaven is described by terms material; that hell 
is made real to the mind by terms and figures phys- 
ical. This same law of expression runs through 
all revelation. It is figurative to all who require 
the figure; it is spiritual to all who can rise above 
the figure and comprehend the spiritual truth as 
it is. 

Sixth. Up to this point in our presentation of 
this explanation all human beings of sound mind 
and moral accountability have the same power to 
experience spiritual truth and to comprehend spirit- 
ual law. At this point is the parting of the ways; 
the way of life, and the way of death. If the soul 
enters the way of life it chooses obedience to and 
worship and knowledge of God. If it enters the way 
of death, it chooses to do its own will, to refuse 
worship of God and to be ignorant of his existence. 
The former choice leads to the development of three 
spiritual powers which we have elsewhere described. 
The latter choice leads to the destruction of these 
three powers, wherefore the impossibility of their 
development forever afterwards. Prom this point 
on therefore we must keep in mind these two classes 
of human beings and we will confine our explanation 
wholly to that class which chooses obedience worship 
and knowledge. The second class can never get be- 
yond that knowledge of the spiritual existence which 
comes by and through the development of this one 
spiritual power. They are and will ever be limited 
by it, and this one power will limit all they can 



128 THE BOOK OF JOB 

ever know of spiritual truth after the making of the 
choice which we have named. 

Seventh. Devoting our thoughts, therefore, to 
those who have chosen obedience, we continue. The 
human plane of life is low, when we seek to know 
spiritual truths. It is only possible that we should 
know such truths in their plainest and simplest ex- 
pression. We begin at the very bottom of spiritual 
knowledge the same as we begin at the bottom of 
physical knowledge. We advance slowly and only to 
a very limited degree during our human existence. 
This is sufficient for our earthly needs and secures 
for us the possibilities of an everlasting spiritual 
life. If we cannot advance beyond the conception 
of God and heaven by means of material thought, 
it is well, and spiritual existence will enlarge this 
knowledge. If, however, we can disassociate the 
spiritual and the material, and can conceive of God 
as a spirit, and of heaven as a spiritual state, it is 
better, by so much as such conceptions advance our 
spiritual knowledge and the better prepare us for 
the truths of the spiritual existence. The thoughts of 
the great majority of the human race are now limited 
by human environment and material existence. They 
cannot rise above these, and they must die without 
any greater knowledge of spiritual truths than can 
be acquired by and through such material thoughts. 
That this is asserting that they are thereby unpre- 
pared to enter into the kingdom of heaven, is far- 
thest from our thoughts, but there is a danger in 
this limited knowledge and distorted understanding 
which we cannot avoid pointing out. It is not every 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 129 

one who starts out earnestly desirous to obey, to 
worship and to know God, who perseveres in such 
desires and efforts until death. This assertion we 
will accept as truth from our observation and study 
of men. We admit and believe that the effort is 
earnest. We also believe that a measure of success 
crowns the effort. Such souls attain a measure of 
the joy of obedience and worship and a measure 
of knowledge of God. Then, ' why do they relapse 
into disobedience? The inquiry is answered by one 
word— doubt. Doubt lies behind all sin; doubt as to 
the necessity for obedience; doubt as to the joy of 
worship ; doubt as to the existence of God. Doubt 
is a shadow which follows every Christian through- 
out human life. Doubt may enter through death 
into the heavenly kingdom of the spiritual exist- 
ence. This is asserting nothing either strange or 
new. Doubt may continue without end, but not in 
heaven. Doubt must eventually come to an end in 
heaven, for the soul which cannot rise above it will 
certainly disobey and fall. Then, souls may sin in 
heaven? Yes, forever yes, while doubt remains in 
heaven. If the kingdom of heaven begins in the 
spiritual nature of man in earth, as we know it does, 
and men through doubt fall from that kingdom 
through sin into spiritual death, so may they after 
that they have passed through death, provided always 
that their doubts continue. If they do not find and 
realize the heaven they pictured and believed in, while 
in earth life, it is possible for them to cease their 
efforts after spiritual knowledge, give way to doubt 
and fall. This is a trial all must endure either in 



130 THE BOOK OF JOB 

human or in spiritual existence. All these things 
stand in the way of our comprehension of the law 
we are discussing. We will now turn to that which 
stands in the way of our declaring this law. 

Eighth. We first take up the thought that the spir- 
itual nature of the soul is very imperfectly developed 
during its human life. The imperfect action of its 
spiritual powers renders it difficult for the soul to ac- 
quire spiritual truths. Such truths come to it alone 
through these powers. There is no other channel 
along which they may reach the soul. This we have 
before asserted and have sustained the assertion by 
argument which may have been understood and 
accepted and may have been misunderstood and 
rejected. If the latter, its repetition would be 
unavailing. We assume the former and proceed. 
The absence of all spiritual powers renders the 
acquisition of spiritual knowledge impossible; the 
feeble use of such powers renders the acquisition of 
such knowledge meager and uncertain. Such knowl- 
edge only becomes positive and well defined when 
such powers, or some of them, are working up to 
their full capacity, when measured by the state in 
which the soul exists. Nothing less than this can 
satisfy the soul of the existence of the spiritual truths 
which it seeks. How many feel that they are within 
this classification? Certainly not many. It there- 
fore follows that the great majority of those who are 
seeking spiritual truths have but an uncertain and 
indefinite conception of the truths they seek. Will 
you admit that you are one of this large class? If 
you will not admit this, you will at least scarcely deny 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 131 

it. This is the reason, and the sole reason, that all 
that knowledge which pertains to the spiritual exist- 
ence is so shadowy, so indefinite, and so uncertain in 
your mind. This is one reason why it is so hard to 
declare this law by and through which we know God 
both here and hereafter. 

Ninth. Our next thought is the infirmity of the 
spiritual powers when at their best, both in human and 
in spiritual existence. The human soul is a weakling 
among God's spiritual creatures. It is the lowest, 
the feeblest, the dullest of them all. A comparison 
of the intellectual powers of the child with the high- 
est possible attainments of the matured human intel- 
lect, may serve to lead our minds to a comparison 
of the spiritual powers of the human soul, with the 
unknown and unknowable powers of creatures nearest 
God, but this is all it can do. All that we may know 
is that God has created us to fill the plane of intel- 
ligent existence wherein we find ourselves; that he 
has endowed us with a nature and with powers suited 
thereto, and that we may be and should be happy and 
contented therewith. Upon our plane of existence we 
could not use or enjoy any higher natures or greater 
powers than those which we possess. God's revela- 
tion to us teaches us this truth. Such revelation 
comes to us through every order of life below us, 
down to the very lowest that is discernible to the 
human mind. Each is happy and contented with 
that with which it is endowed, and that which it 
possesses is perfectly adapted to its requirements in 
the plane of life which it occupies. The divine law 
thus revealed to us is applicable from the lowest order 



132 THE BOOK OF JOB 

of life to the highest. It is equally applicable to our 
own existence, both physical and spiritual. If we 
recognize and accept this truth then we must be con- 
tent with such spiritual knowledge as our limited 
spiritual powers will enable us to acquire. This in 
eternity may be great, as compared with our present 
spiritua] ignorance, but it must always be small when 
compared with that knowledge which may be acquired 
by creatures of vastly higher lives and of vastly 
superior powers, than are our own. Such creatures 
must know God by the same law by which we know 
him, for no two creatures may ever know their Cre- 
ator by other than one and the same law. 

Tenth. To these difficulties in the way of declaring 
such law must be added another which is greater than 
either. This is the impossibility of aiding these spir- 
itual powers by any material figure, either here or 
hereafter. We have heretofore asserted that material 
figures do aid the soul in acquiring spiritual truths. 
This is so only in so far as such figures point the way 
to such truths when they are first sought after. When 
any conception of a spiritual truth, however imperfect, 
has been grasped by the soul, then such figure must 
take its place below such conception. In other words, 
the conception of the truth must be higher than the 
figure which led up to it, or else it cannot be a con- 
ception of the truth at all. After any conception 
of a spiritual truth has been once grasped by the 
soul, then all material figures perish. This is true in 
earth-life, and being true in this life it is manifestly 
true in the spiritual existence. Now, try to think of 
God without associating with him any thought which 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 133 

is associated with or dependent upon a material exist- 
ence. You will thus eliminate from your conception 
of God all thoughts of form, of size, of substance, of 
appearance, of place or location ; all thoughts of sound, 
of sight by means of vision or light; all thoughts of 
words from him or addressed to him ; all thoughts of a 
personal presence as denned or limited by location or 
place; all thoughts of an adoration and worship which 
is in any manner dependent upon any material exist- 
ence of God, of ourselves, or of any place ; all thoughts 
of heaven as a place, of hell as a place ; all thoughts 
of joy and of sorrow which would require any mate- 
rial existence for their realization; do this and let 
your spiritual powers act untrammeled by earthly 
and material existence, and what have we? A spir- 
itual conception of God. Have you done this? Are 
you capable of doing it? If not, you will have to 
do it before you can know God in your spiritual 
existence. We do not by this assertion mean that 
you must do this before you can enter heaven, for this 
is not true ; but it is true that you must do this before 
you can know God in your spiritual existence. This 
truth and this necessity make it extremely difficult 
to declare the law by which alone we must know 
God, in language both comprehensible and intelligible. 
This brings us to the conclusion of this declara- 
tion of truth, which we sum up as follows: God's 
existence is wholly spiritual and we must ever so 
conceive him. To us his existence is spiritual because 
that is the highest existence we can conceive of any 
being possessing. In truth God's life is not spiritual, 
but is far above and beyond any spiritual existence. 



134 THE BOOK OF JOB 

God's life is, in truth, a life above and beyond the 
possible conception of any created intelligence. God's 
life has been revealed to all of his intelligent crea- 
tures from the beginning of their existence ; revealed 
to each upon the plane of existence which it itself 
occupies; revealed to man upon both planes of exist- 
ence which he occupies, the spiritual and the physical. 
The physical revelation to man was transient, the 
spiritual revelation is everlasting. Christ's physical 
life was upon the plane of our physical life. In like 
manner Christ's spiritual life is upon the plane of 
our spiritual life. Christ will remain with us in our 
spiritual existence forever, as he is now with us in 
our spiritual existence, even though that be yet in 
earth. Christ is with us always, even to the ends of 
the earth. This is his declaration and it is the experi- 
ence of his true worshipers. Christ is with them in 
spirit, in earth life, as he will be with them in spirit 
in their spiritual existence ; in the one the same as in 
the other, save that in our spiritual existence our 
spiritual natures and powers will be greatly quick- 
ened, so that that which we now see through a glass, 
dimly, we shall then see openly. The method and the 
law by which we behold him in our earthly existence 
are the method and the law by which we will behold 
him in our spiritual existence. The difference is 
alone in the degree of clearness with which we com- 
prehend and know our Saviour. As Christ through 
his earthly life became to men the clearest and the 
fullest revelation of God to them, so will Christ in 
his spiritual existence ever be to souls in spiritual 
existence the clearest and the fullest revelation of 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 135 

God to them. As Christ is not the only revelation of 
God to man in human life, so also he is not the only- 
revelation of God to the souls of men in their spiritual 
existence. He is but one of such revelations. God 
reveals himself to the souls of men in their spiritual 
existence in the same manner in which he reveals 
himself to them in human life, and in no other way. 
God's Holy Spirit is the medium of such revelation 
both in earth life and in spiritual existence. "With- 
out the Holy Spirit God would be forever hidden from 
the souls of men. Not but that man has the spiritual 
powers to know God, without the aid of the Holy 
Spirit, but that without such aid man would never 
develop these powers. 

In the foregoing we have laid the foundation for 
such declaration of the law by which alone we may 
know God, as we are able to conceive. We will 
express it thus: God in infinite wisdom has created 
beings possessing many orders or degrees of intel- 
ligence. Of such beings man is the lowest. God has 
bestowed upon man a dual nature, physical and spir- 
itual. Through the physical, God has connected man 
with the orders of life below intelligent existence. 
In doing this he has made him mortal as to his phys- 
ical nature and life, but immortal as to his spiritual 
nature and life. Through his physical and mortal 
nature and life, man cannot know his Creator. 
Through his spiritual and immortal nature and life, 
man may know his Creator. To do this he must use 
the powers which belong to that nature and these 
powers alone. In man's physical existence his spir- 
itual powers are subservient to those physical powers 



136 THE BOOK OF JOB 

which are essential to his continued human existence ; 
therefore as a last and greatest aid "to these, spiritual 
powers God gave to man a physical revelation of him- 
self, in the person, by the life, and through the char- 
acter of Jesus Christ his Son, who was in God's 
semblance in human flesh; in God's likeness in 
spiritual character; and was God's revealed self 
both in his human and in his spiritual existence. 
Christ was God manifested in the flesh ; Christ is God 
and shall forever be God manifested in the spirit of 
that human flesh. God's revelation of himself to man 
is therefore threefold: First, direct, as by his crea- 
tive power; second, through his Holy Spirit teaching 
us his infinite wisdom; third, through Jesus Christ, 
teaching, manifesting and declaring his infinite love. 
If any man receives any one of these three revelations, 
he of necessity receives all, as each is supported by the 
other two and cannot exist without such support. No 
one of these revelations can be truly accepted by man 
except through the powers of his own spiritual nature ; 
therefore such acceptance is wholly separate and 
removed from the powers of man's physical nature 
and life. The acceptance of this revelation in its 
entirety by and through the powers of man's spiritual 
nature brings to the soul a spiritual knowledge of its 
Creator. God communes with such soul through his 
Holy Spirit. Christ receives such soul to himself in 
spirit, and the effect of sin in it is thereby destroyed. 
This, then, is the law, and this the method of the law 
whereby the soul of man must know its God or forever 
remain in ignorance of him. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 137 

What, then, is God, and what may we know of 
him? Human thought is powerless to answer what 
God is. It alone has the power to conceive what we 
may know of him. This, however, serves as the 
answer to the first part of the inquiry, insofar as we 
have the power to know that truth. To conceive of God 
without form, without expression dependent upon 
form, without location or place, without voice or word 
or directly transferred thought, is possible to some 
and is impossible to others. To thus conceive of God, 
and to hold such conception above and free from the 
assertions, the principles and the conceptions of the 
Pantheist, is a still more difficult effort. Pantheism is 
distorted truth; a step in the direction of truth, and 
marks the limit to which a soul unaided may go along 
the way of truth. Pantheism is error, but it is error 
of the kind which stands as a milestone marking prog- 
ress along the way of truth. Such errors bless the 
world; without them knowledge would stand still. 
Pantheism fails to rise to a conception of the per- 
sonality, the individuality, of God, supreme, above 
and separated from the manifestation of God by and 
through all things. Into this higher conception I 
have striven to enter. Into it I am striving to lead 
others. It is a view of truth, or rather a compre- 
hension of truth, which is not for all an easy under- 
taking. It is a spiritual conception, not an intel- 
lectual conception. Reason has nothing to do with it. 
Spirit has everything to do with it, By this I mean 
that it is spiritual knowledge which must be acquired 



138 THE BOOK OF JOB 

through the soul's spiritual powers. Reason stops 
with Pantheism; it may aid that far— it can aid no 
farther. To be a Pantheist is to be right in the 
minor part and to be wrong in the major part. To 
rise into that broader conception of God which in- 
cludes Pantheism as one of its minor parts is far 
nearer to the ultimate and unalterable truth. God 
therefore is a Being, individual in his life, triune 
in the manifestation of that life, spiritually, and 
universal in the manifestation of that life physically. 
Pantheism is a physical truth; trinity is a spiritual 
truth, and unity is a truth super-spiritual and there- 
fore incomprehensible to spiritual existence and pow- 
ers. The soul of man acquires its highest knowledge 
through its spiritual powers. These reveal to it the 
Trinity of God, and this must ever be its highest 
conception of God. "What, then, may we know of 
God ? This is a question which may only be answered 
individually. We must know God for ourselves. No 
other can know God for us, neither can another tell 
us what God is. Knowledge of God is an experience. 
It is something that cannot be transferred, something 
that cannot be imparted or communicated. Knowl- 
edge of God is religion in its broadest and fullest 
sense. It includes knowledge of the Holy Spirit of 
God, knowledge of Jesus Christ the Son of God, 
knowledge of sins forgiven through the taking away 
of the effect of sin, knowledge of spiritual life through 
the experiencing of such life. Knowledge such as this 
is the knowledge of God of which I speak. Nothing 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 139 

Less than this is such knowledge. I have such knowl- 
edge, and thank my God for it. If you have it, then 
you know what I have, but I cannot tell you what it 
is in any other manner or by any other means than 
through your own experience. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

RESURRECTION. — ELIHU. —PERFECTION. —SPIRITUAL EX- 
ISTENCE.— SPIRITUAL EXALTATION. 

The thought that the body of man, though dead, 
will rise again into a new physical life, is as old as 
is revelation. It is a thought to which the Christian 
clings, and has clung, in all ages of the Christian 
Church. It is a thought, a hope, a belief, which is 
older than the Christian Church. It goes back to the 
beginning of spiritual understanding. It is a thought, 
a hope, a belief, which meets the yearning of the 
human soul, hence it has been given to the soul. Is 
it true or is it not true? It is both. As a figure it 
is true. As a material or physical reality it is not 
true. What, then, are we to say of the words of 
Job, "But man dieth and wasteth away; yea, man 
giveth up the ghost and where is he? As the waters 
fail from the sea, and the flood decayeth and drieth 
up ; so man lieth down and riseth not ; till the heavens 
be no more they shall not awake or be raised out of 
their sleep"? What truth is declared by these 
words? This, and this only. That the body of man 
shall rest in the grave forever; that it shall never 
awake from the sleep of death. There can be no other 
meaning given to it. Should another be attempted, 
what is it? Is it that when the heavens shall have 
passed away and are no more, then shall the body 
come out of the dust of the grave? This is the 

140 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 141 

thought that comes to many upon reading this declara- 
tion. It does not sustain this thought. There is no 
declaration that the body shall then awaken out of 
this sleep. It is simply an oriental form of expression 
given to the thought that the body shall never awaken 
out of the sleep of the grave. What, then, is the 
resurrection ? When is it, and why is it ? The resur- 
rection is the springing of the soul out of its earthly 
into its spiritual existence, shorn of earthly 
hindrances. This comes immediately, that is, soon 
after physical death, and following a brief period of 
unconsciousness or semi-unconsciousness. Why is this 
so? Because the soul's awakening must be gradual, 
must be a growth. This is taught by every revelation 
of nature as well as by the beginning of the soul's 
own existence. Growth is the law of change in all 
God's kingdoms. Nothing is brought into being with 
matured conditions or matured powers. All matured 
states, all matured powers, all matured conditions, are 
the result of growth. Our Saviour, Jesus Christ, 
himself became obedient unto this universal law. 
Resurrection, then, is the beginning of this new 
growth as well as the continuance of this new growth, 
at least to that point where it may be said to be 
developed. When, therefore, a soul has through such 
growth attained that state of spiritual existence 
wherein it may use its spiritual powers in a normal 
manner, it is resurrected from earthly death. Such 
period may be long or may be short, as measured by 
the limitations of time. In the case of our Lord and 
Saviour, it was upon the third day after death. Jesus 
lived a perfect human life. He was possessed of a 



142 THE BOOK OF JOB 

physically perfect human development. The spir- 
itual existence which sprang from and became an 
expression of this perfect physical existence, was 
fully developed and declared within three days. This 
period, therefore, marks the shortest possible period 
within which the human soul may be fully resur- 
rected from its physical death. Of the other limit 
wherein this must happen we have no revelation 
which is definite. The question, then, remains, Why 
is there, then, a necessity for a resurrection ? This we 
will answer as we may be able to express some truths 
which are more or less hidden. We acknowledge the 
truth that we came into a normal use of our physical 
powers and senses by a gradual growth extending 
over a considerable period of infancy. We possessed 
all these powers and senses from our birth, but we 
were not able to normally use and profit by them. 
Therefore there is a necessity for a prolonged period 
of infancy in the human state. The gradual develop- 
ment of these senses and powers creates this necessity. 
Growth by gradual development is a law of life. 
There is no exception to it among the higher orders 
of creation and none among the higher orders of cre- 
ated powers. Therefore when the change comes from 
the earthly to the spiritual state the development of 
the soul's spiritual senses and powers must be, in 
obedience to this universal law of growth, of gradual 
development. The soul cannot spring at a bound from 
a matured and developed physical existence into a 
matured and developed spiritual existence, any more 
than it could have been born into a matured and 
developed physical existence. No soul was ever so 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 143 

created, not even the souls of Adam and Eve, for they 
were created infants in point of development, phys- 
ically, intellectually and spiritually, if such law of 
growth as we have declared, exists. God never has 
ignored, suspended, or changed any law which he 
has revealed to man. That such law of growth does 
exist, the historic birth and growth and life of 
Jesus Christ is a sufficient revelation and demon- 
stration. What, then, shall we say of the creation 
of Adam and of Eve? This is not the time nor the 
place to apply this law to the truths declared concern- 
ing them. This will be done at the proper time and 
in the proper connection. The law of growth, then, 
if accepted, requires a period of inactivity imme- 
diately following physical death. Such period does 
exist. It may be long or it may be short. As we have 
already said, it cannot be shorter than three days, 
because Christ our Saviour was himself but raised 
within that period from among the souls of men who 
slept with him in physical death, and his resurrection 
was the first, that is, the earliest, the quickest fruits, 
from among those who had thus slept, or were then 
sleeping. Christ's earthly or physical childhood was 
itself brief, for at twelve years, the record tells us, he 
possessed the powers of ripened and matured man- 
hood. His second period of rest, that with the sleep- 
ing souls of the dead, was the very brief period of 
three days. We know how the period of twelve years 
compares with the ordinary period of development in 
the ordinary human life, but we cannot know in this 
life how the period of three days compares with the 
ordinary period of the soul's growth into the full pos- 



144 THE BOOK OF JOB 

session of its spiritual powers after physical death. 
It is certainly longer than three days, and may com- 
pare with three days about as the period of twelve 
years compares with the ordinary period for the full 
development of the ordinary man. Eternity is with- 
out measurement or subdivision into periods, there- 
fore it must be impossible for any soul to know the 
period, measured by earthly time, during which it 
was growing into that full possession of its spiritual 
powers which marks the period of its resurrection 
from physical death. As we of earth mark time it 
certainly is not a long period for those who are spir- 
itually prepared for death. A belief in God and a 
belief in and acceptance of the Son of God, carrying 
with it as it must, a belief in and acceptance of God's 
Holy Spirit, prepare the soul for speedy passage 
through this state of growth and gives to it an early 
resurrection from physical death. Disbelief in God 
and the rejection of the Son of God, and consequently 
of God's Holy Spirit, unfit the soul for such growth 
and protract the period of its resurrection from phys* 
ical death. To the former is given the assurance of 
an early, that is, the first, the quickest, resurrection; 
the latter are self-condemned to the second or a later 
resurrection. 

After Job and his three friends had ceased speaking 
another character appears in this drama of human 
life. Elihu is the name which the inspired dramatist 
has chosen, to represent what ? The awakening of the 
soul out of its own self -righteousness into submission 
unto its Creator. In this sacred drama, portraying 
human suffering, the necessity which exists there- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 145 

for, the philosophy of its imposition, the effects of 
which it is the cause and the growth of the soul there- 
under, there is no character endowed simply with 
human powers, which possesses the virtues and the 
discernment of Elihu. Elihu stands for the consum- 
mation of this drama; the perfected soul of man, 
brought up into perfection through suffering. Elihu 
represents human perfection. What is human per- 
fection? We will answer this without fear of criti- 
cism or hope of commendation, for there is no one 
truth in all of God's revelation of truth which is sub- 
jected to so much misconstruction, misinterpretation 
and misunderstanding. Perfection is a divine truth, 
extending from the perfect life of God down through 
every order of created life, to the lowest forms of 
instinctive life. Perfection is the law of all crea- 
tion. God never made an imperfect creature, and no 
creature below man has any power to destroy the 
perfection of its own existence. To man and to crea- 
tures superior to man is given the power to destroy 
the perfection of their own existence. Such perfec- 
tion in man, once destroyed, can alone be regained 
through the individual efforts of the soul itself. Per- 
fection exists for man. It lies within the power of 
all men ; is attained by some men during their human 
existence, and ultimately by all men who enter into 
spiritual life. Perfection is not attained by all men 
during their human existence although they honestly 
desire and seek it. For such the struggle for it passes 
over into that existence which is for them, spiritual 
life. Is there, then, imperfection in heaven? There 
is and there is not. What this means will appear 



146 THE BOOK OF JOB 

further on. "We have thus outlined the thought of 
perfection as we desire to follow it, and we shall 
attempt to declare the truth of perfection along the 
line of this thought. In doing this we will divide the 
subject for the sake of clearness into the following 
heads : 

First. Perfection is a relative and not an abso- 
lute state of existence. 

Second. Perfection is a variable state, and its 
variableness is dependent upon growth, environment 
and the state of the creature's existence. 

Third. The perfection of today may therefore be- 
come imperfection tomorrow, without any change in 
the conduct of the individual. 

Fourth. Perfection is the end of all who enter 
into spiritual life wherever and whenever it may be 
attained. 

First. Perfection is not an absolute state. This 
is the basic thought of the argument which follows. 
That perfection is a variable state is another manner 
of expressing the same thought. Does this assertion 
appear paradoxical? It would be if perfection was 
measured by any one changeless standard. This is 
the thought which may associate with the term per- 
fection, and it is this thought which leads so many 
into unreasonable and untenable positions respecting 
it. For man to become perfect as God is perfect, is 
just as impossible as it is for a brute to become perfect 
as man may become perfect. The perfection of God 
is measured by one standard ; the perfection of a man 
by another standard, and the perfection of a brute 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 147 

by still another standard. You would pronounce it 
blasphemous to assert that a brute may be perfect, 
measuring its perfection by the standard of God's 
perfection. Beware lest you likewise blaspheme by 
the assertion that any man is or may become perfect, 
measuring his perfection by the standard of God's 
perfection. If the former assertion is blasphemy, 
then the latter is the same. Have you ever thus blas- 
phemed your Creator? Do you now thus blaspheme 
your Creator? If you have or if you do, then you 
are the one to whom these words are addressed^ 
not in anger, not in harshness, but in the loving hope 
that you may see the truth as it is revealed. Finite 
powers cannot comprehend the infinite life or the 
infinite attributes of God. It requires the infinite 
to comprehend the infinite. We do not believe that 
this declaration will be controverted by any intelligent 
creature in God's universe of created intelligence. 
If it is, the being disputing it must make himself 
equal with God in all that enters into the power of 
comprehension. We are not certain that such indi- 
viduals do not exist among men. We feel absolutely 
certain that none such do exist among any order of 
creatures higher than man, for if they do exist among 
men they are found among those possessing the least 
spiritual development and understanding. No being 
of any considerable degree of such development and 
understanding can entertain such a thought for an 
instant. This it is which leads us to assert that if 
any such claim is made anywhere in God's universe, 
it will be found among those of the human race who 
are sunken the deepest in spiritual ignorance. It is, 



148 THE BOOK OF JOB m 

therefore, impossible that any creature possessing any- 
other than the lowest degree of spiritual understand- 
ing should claim to comprehend that infinite standard 
which measures the infinite perfection of God. If, 
therefore, we cannot claim a comprehension of the 
infinite standard of perfection and cannot compre- 
hend that infinite perfection which is measured by 
that standard, then we cannot claim an ability to 
attain unto such infinite perfection. If anyone does 
make such claim we have no words to address to him. 
Do we not then admit that we cannot become perfect 
as God is perfect? We admit this; we assert this 
to be truth. If it be truth, then it follows that there 
are at least two standards which measure perfection; 
one which measures the perfection of God, another 
which measures the perfection of the creature. In 
such admission lies the whole of our claim, to wit, 
that perfection is not an absolute state but a relative 
state. 

Second. Perfection, then, being a variable state, 
depends upon growth, environment and the state 
of the existence of the creature. While it is true that 
we cannot comprehend that standard which measures 
the infinite perfection of God, it is true that we may 
comprehend the standard which measures human 
perfection. The latter standard is plain and simple, 
as is the revelation of God, in its essentials. If we 
were to formulate it in its simplicity and beauty, it 
would be in these words, Obey God, and do this 
through a love of obedience. Whatever creature really 
does this is perfect, whether such creature be human 
or superhuman. If the creature be human, such 
obedience is a very different thing from what it is if 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 149 

the creature be superhuman. Among human beings 
themselves such obedience, when measured by that 
which the individual thinks, believes and does, varies 
as widely as do the thoughts, the beliefs and the acts 
of human beings. There is and there can be no 
standard of perfection, therefore, among creatures, 
which governs the thoughts, the beliefs and the acts 
of those who are perfect. Perfection can alone be 
measured by the purpose of the creature to obey, and 
by the fact that such obedience springs from the 
creature's love of obedience. This kind of perfection 
we may all claim, and many do claim. Of no other 
kind can we have any real knowledge. 

Third. The foregoing being true, the perfection 
of the individual today may become imperfection to- 
morrow, without any change in that which he does. 
In other words, the individual may do today, and be 
perfect, that which he cannot do tomorrow and be 
perfect. If today he believes an act to be right, and 
in obedience to God, and he does it through a love of 
obedience, he is perfect. If tomorrow he does not 
believe the same act to be right and in obedience to 
God, and he does it, he is imperfect. It is unneces- 
sary to enter into the causes which change men's 
beliefs. They are numerous and of varying power. 
Among them, however, the most powerful are, envi- 
ronment and the growth of spiritual understanding. 
These change the beliefs of men rapidly and posi- 
tively. Xo two more powerful factors are given to 
those who pray and labor that the kingdom of God 
may come upon the earth. 



150 THE BOOK OF JOB 

Fourth. Perfection as thus denned and explained 
is the end of all who enter into spiritual life, whether 
it comes to them in their human or in their spiritual 
existence. 

God finally spake to Job out of the whirlwind, that 
is, out of the tumult of an awakened spirit. The 
voice of God was the voice of his Spirit communing 
with the spiritual powers of his servant Job, after 
that Job had experienced that awakening and that 
submission of the soul typified by Elihu. Before such 
experience it was impossible that Job should have 
heard this voice of God, or that God should have thus 
declared himself to Job. Herein God reveals to man 
a great truth. It is, that the soul of man may be 
exalted through its own experiences into a state 
wherein it is possible for it to commune with its 
Creator as men commune face to face. Job's soul 
was thus exalted. To him this exaltation came 
through suffering, physical, mental, spiritual suffer- 
ing, combined. For Job such suffering was a necessity 
in order that he attain such spiritual exaltation. 
Suffering is not always a necessity preceding such 
exaltation, neither does suffering always produce it. 
God leads one soul up this mount of transfiguration by 
one pathway; he leads another soul to the same spir- 
itual height by an entirely different pathway. Trans- 
figuration means spiritual exaltation in human exist- 
ence. It meant that for Christ our Saviour ; it means 
that to every soul whom God chooses to lead to such 
heighth. It is a mount no soul can ascend by its own 
will. It is a mount no soul can refuse to ascend, 
and live, when God commands it to ascend. Jesus 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 151 

Christ ascended the mount of transfiguration in obedi- 
ence to his Father's will, not for his own pleasure, 
his own good or for his own perfection, but solely to 
establish and leave a revelation of this truth to all 
men for all time to come. Christ was already spir- 
itually perfect; he was already spiritually exalted; 
but his life must needs declare this truth to man, that 
such spiritual exaltation is possible for the soul of 
man in its human existence ; not possible for those who 
seek it as did Peter and possibly James and John also, 
but possible for those whom God leads thereto by his 
own will and not by their will. 

Into this state of spiritual exaltation Job was 
led through suffering. What, then, is this state which 
we have called spiritual exaltation? To answer this 
question we will propound another: What is spir- 
itual existence? Having further answered this last 
as best we may, we will attempt to answer the former. 
In doing this we will consider it in the following 
order : 

First. Spiritual existence is a normal existence. 

Second. It is a present existence. 

Third. It is an unending existence. 

Fourth. It is limited to the human race alone. 

Fifth. Christ could only enter it through phys- 
ical life. 

First. Spiritual existence is a part of the soul's 
existence from the hour of its creation and will con- 
tinue so to be forever. In fact, after human death 
it becomes its sole existence. Are we now in spir- 
itual existence ? I answer this question unhesitatingly 



152 THE BOOK OF JOB 

in the affirmative, with the single qualification that 
at the present time our spiritual existence is asso- 
ciated with a physical existence. These two states of 
existence are distinctly separate. They are unlike 
in all except in one particular, which is, that they 
are alike in that which constitutes and declares them. 
Let us consider first what constitutes and declares 
our physical existence, and in this way approach the 
thought of what constitutes and declares our spiritual 
existence. Our physical existence consists of con- 
scious experiences and of nothing else. There is noth- 
ing whatever in our physical existence, making up a 
part of our physical existence, or associated with it, 
which is not covered by the term conscious experiences. 
While it is not true that our physical knowledge is 
limited by our conscious experiences, yet it is true 
that our physical existence is so limited. There is a 
difference between physical existence and physical 
knowledge. The latter is based upon physical experi- 
ence, but it need not necessarily be our own expe- 
rience. Our physical existence is then the sum of 
our physical experiences. It is this and nothing 
more than this. If we have your concurrence in this 
assertion of truth, then you are prepared to accept the 
further assertion that our spiritual existence does now 
consist of and ever shall consist of, our spiritual 
experiences; that the sum of these experiences con- 
stitutes now, and ever shall constitute, our spiritual 
existence, and the whole of that existence. All phys- 
ical experiences, constituting the whole of our physical 
existence, come to the soul through its five physical 
senses, or through such of them as remain to it if part 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 153 

of them have been lost to it. In like manner all 
spiritual experiences constituting the whole of spir- 
itual existence come to the soul through its spiritual 
senses or powers, or through such of them as remain 
to it, if part of them are lost to it. Normal physical 
existence is the aggregate of the experiences which 
come to the soul through the enjoyment and use of 
all of its physical senses arid powers. Normal spir- 
itual existence is the aggregate of the experiences 
which come to the soul through the enjoyment and 
use of all of its spiritual senses and powers. Physical 
existence may be contracted or narrowed by the loss 
of one or more of the five physical senses, and the 
consequent loss to the soul of such conscious experi- 
ences which could have come to it alone through such 
lost sense or senses. The soul's spiritual existence 
may in like manner be contracted or narrowed by the 
loss of one or more of its spiritual senses or powers, 
and the consequent loss to it of those conscious 
experiences which could have come to it alone through 
such lost senses or powers. In the foregoing we have 
limited our thoughts to the five physical senses, with 
which we have compared what we term spiritual 
senses or powers. We have used these expressions 
because in our present existence it is difficult for us 
to comprehend our own spiritual senses or powers. 
To illustrate: In physical existence the sub-sense or 
faculty of tune is dependent upon the sense of hear- 
ing and could riot exist without that sense. So in 
our spiritual existence I am convinced there are many 
such sub-senses or faculties which are directly de- 
pendent upon a controlling spiritual sense. We are 



154 THE BOOK OF JOB 

therefore justified in asserting the belief, amounting 
almost to assurance, that in our spiritual existence 
there shall be developed and matured similar sub- 
senses or faculties almost innumerable, which are 
wholly dependent upon what we call one well defined 
and definite spiritual sense, even as the faculty of 
tune, of rhythm, of time, the joy of melody, the exalta- 
tion of grandeur, the sweet influence of beauty, the 
inspirations which come to the soul from the earth 
and from the heavens, are all dependent upon the 
physical senses of hearing and of seeing. If all such 
pleasures of physical existence come to the soul 
through its physical senses, we may thereby be 
assured that still greater joys await the soul which 
retains all of its spiritual senses and powers unim- 
paired. We have elsewhere named the spiritual 
senses and powers which we can in some measure 
comprehend. We have also shown the effect of willful 
disobedience upon these senses or powers, subjects 
upon which we cannot enter in this connection. 

The five physical senses have to do with what we 
call real existence, physical existence, matter, and the 
laws and phenomena dependent upon matter. The 
soul's spiritual senses cannot comprehend and know 
matter any more than its five physical senses can 
comprehend and know spirit. Therefore when the 
five physical senses perish and are lost to the soul 
through physical death, all real (that is, material,) 
existence ceases. The soul thereby loses all its power 
to know matter. Its existence thereafter is what 
would seem to us to be an unreal existence. It is an 
unreal existence in the proper sense of that term. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 155 

it is an existence into which nothing real can enter; 
no material form, no experience dependent upon mat- 
ter or npon any material law. No conception of 
matter, other than that temporarily retained through 
memory, can come to the soul. It is a new life 
wherein the spiritual existence of earth has burst 
forth into the full fruition of the soul's spiritual 
nature and spiritual powers. 

Second. This spiritual existence is a present 
existence. "We are not required to wait until death 
shall have freed us from this material existence in 
order that we may have knowledge of the spiritual. 
It follows as a necessity that such knowledge must 
be limited during the material existence because this 
is the overshadowing, the paramount, the controlling 
existence while it continues. If this was not true 
the soul could not fulfill the purposes of its earthly 
life. It is then true that you and I now possess and 
may know and enjoy our spiritual existence. That 
this is true I certainly realize. If you do not it is 
because you are not living up to the full measure 
of your powers and your privileges. Lest this asser- 
tion be misconstrued, I must add that the spiritual 
powers which all should strive to develop are obedi- 
ence and worship, these two bestowing all the spiritual 
knowledge which it is right for man in his human 
estate to know. To go beyond this is accompanied 
with risks I have warned against from the first I 
have written, risks which no man can avoid and which 
none can escape, except God lead him. W3 I have 
said this I have said the least that I dare say. 



156 THE BOOK OF JOB 

Third. This spiritual existence which we now 
live had its beginning with our creation, and that 
creation was associated with our human birth. We 
are born but once, we die but once. We possess 
continuing self-conscious existence extending from 
our human birth throughout an eternity to come, and 
such existence is spiritual. Our material existence 
is but the foundation upon which our spiritual 
existence rests, and without which it could not exist. 
Spirit is not material in any sense whatever, yet the 
spiritual could not exist without the material first 
existing. Why is this true? Because the spiritual 
is a reflex of the material, springing from the mate- 
rial, attaching to the material, being an effect of 
which the material is the cause. The nearest I can 
lead you to the thought that comes to me is by this 
illustration: Form and expression are attributes of 
matter. Neither could exist without matter, yet 
neither are material in themselves, in any sense, 
except that they are dependent upon matter. 

All matter can be said to have form whether that 
form be visible or invisible to the human eye. This 
we can safely assert because experience and observa- 
tion teach us that form is an attribute of matter and 
that matter cannot exist without form, either visible 
or invisible. The same can be said of expression. 
All visible matter carries with it some expression to 
a sensitive and appreciative soul taking cognizance 
of its form. Is there anyone who never saw an 
expression in a building, in a great rock, in a tree, 
in a landscape, in the ocean's wave and swell, in a 
flower, in a leaf, in a blade of grass? If there is 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 157 

such an one, then for him I must use a plainer illus- 
tration. For you is there an expression in a statue, 
in a pictured likeness or image? If so, that is suf- 
ficient. The form of matter and the expression of 
matter, are the spirit of matter. The form of the 
creature and the expression of the intelligent soul 
given out through that form are the spirit of the 
creature. Is there, then, a spiritual existence for 
matter not animated by an intelligent soul? It is 
sufficient to answer that there is such an existence 
for all that is so animated. Bear in mind that I have 
used the form and the expression of matter, both 
animate and inanimate, both intelligent and non- 
intelligent, as an illustration solely, and that I have 
done this to lead the mind towards a comprehension 
of what spirit is. I do not claim that I have the 
power to comprehend the truth of the existence of 
spirit, except as a shadowy outline, but I do claim 
that the full comprehension of it lies in the direction 
I have indicated. Such existence as I have pointed 
out is everlasting. While it originated in matter and 
could not have existed without matter, yet it is not in 
itself material, and therefore may be and is ever- 
lasting. 

Fourth. Spiritual life is limited to the human 
race alone because no creature below human is en- 
dowed with spiritual powers by and through which it 
may discern a spiritual existence. If such creatures 
did possess such powers then they would have such 
existence. This is the same as saying that such exist- 
ence does continue for them, but to them it is 
oblivion because of the lack of powers to discern it. 



158 THE BOOK OF JOB 

There is a spiritual existence for the brute as cer- 
tainly as that there is a spiritual existence for man, 
because the law upon which spiritual existence is 
based applies to all material existence. Nothing be- 
low man has the spiritual powers to discern its own 
spiritual existence. Inanimate matter is devoid of all 
power of discerning its own material existence, hence 
its existence can only be known to such orders of 
creatures as have the powers necessary to discern it. 
This may serve to illustrate the thought which we 
wish to give, which is this, that as inanimate matter 
now is to the brute creation so will the spiritual state 
of the brute creation be to the spiritual existence of 
the human being. It will be recognized as a truth, 
a fact, an existence; this and nothing more. There 
is no self-conscious spiritual existence for any brute 
creature, but there is a spiritual existence for every 
brute creature which the soul of man may discern and 
know as a truth and as a fact only. The same is true 
of every material substance whether animate or inani- 
mate, of the form and expression of which the soul of 
man can now take cognizance. Lest I be misunder- 
stood here let me express this truth in another form. 
The spiritual senses and powers of the human soul 
are powerless to take cognizance of anything which is 
material, hence to the soul after human death there 
can be no cognizable material existence, but there 
will be a cognizable spiritual existence dependent 
upon and springing out of such material existence. 
This latter is not material in any sense. It is the 
spirit of matter manifested to the spirit of the soul. 
If this is incomprehensible then it must end the 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 159 

thought, for I have asserted from the beginning that 
the powers which are dependent upon and are allied 
with matter cannot comprehend the spiritual. I have 
carried the thought as it comes to me, in the direc- 
tion of ultimate truth as we shall all experience it, 
just as far as I command language to do this. 

Fifth. Spiritual existence as thus denned is abso- 
lutely dependent upon a material existence. The Son 
of God and Saviour of men could not have had a 
spiritual existence except he had first a material exist- 
ence. God purposed that he should have both, and 
that purpose Christ fulfilled through human birth, 
human life and human death, and thus, and thus 
alone entered into the spiritual existence of the hu- 
man soul. It is in this existence that we shall ever 
know him, not as we know God, but as we know each 
other. We shall know him also as we know God, but 
that is not as we know each other, for we can never 
know God thus. 

Such is spiritual existence. What, then, is spir- 
itual exaltation in human existence? Spiritual exal- 
tation is a state of spiritual existence which normally 
belongs to untrammelled spiritual existence after 
death, but which God in his own wisdom and for the 
fulfillment of his own purposes sometimes bestows 
upon men yet in human existence. It is the ability 
to use a spiritual sense, prematurely developed. Such 
premature development is dependent, first and above 
all, upon the direct will of God. God does not de- 
velop this sense as a special or a direct gift or by 
use of arbitrary power, but only by the use of means 
which in themselves are the cause of such develop- 



160 THE BOOK OF JOB 

ment. That is to say, that the same means applied 
to any other soul would become the cause of the same 
effect upon that soul. We will inquire, then, what 
are the means used in producing such development? 
I do not claim to be able to comprehend or to name 
all the means that are thus used by God, but I do 
claim to comprehend something of some of them. Of 
those I can name the most important are heredity and 
environment and those appearing to me of less 
importance, human suffering, human relationships 
and human death. Under these five heads we will 
probably find all that we may know of the causes 
producing spiritual exaltation. We will take them 
up in their order. 

Heredity is God's master workman in the build- 
ing of the moral nature. To it all other influences 
are subservient. Heredity is the divine law of a 
divine selection, and by this law God fashions and 
shapes and endows the man for the emergency. Not 
in one generation nor in two is this done, but through 
an untold and unknown number of generations go 
down the traits of character and the developing 
powers until all converge upon and determine one 
human character, and that man is a man of destiny 
under God's will. He is the man for the emergency. 
He is the man whom God thrusts out to meet the 
emergency. He is the man who, resisting, is powerless 
to resist, and who accepting cannot fail. God has 
written this truth in the annals of the fading cen- 
turies of the past. He rewrites it in the annals of 
the passing centuries of undoubted history. He will 
continue to write is as lone: as men live and act in 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 161 

human life. God governs, and the government of 
God contains no element of doubt, uncertainty or 
chance. Neither you nor I, nor all humanity com- 
bined, can vary by aught what is to be, as God has 
purposed it. What, then, are we ? Automatons ? We 
are and we are not. God's foreknowledge has made 
of us automatons; God's will has made of us free 
agents; but God's will in bestowing upon us free 
agency has reserved unto himself his own divine law 
of heredity and through this law he guides and bends 
the will of man into harmony with his own divine will 
and purpose. 

My will is free, absolutely free, but my will is 
not the same as it would have been had existence 
come to me through another father and another 
mother, or through other grandfathers or other grand- 
mothers, for my existence could not be separated from 
their existence. Xo other being was ever born on 
earth just like me, neither could I have been the same 
I now am had there been any variation whatever from 
that, line of forebears down which my own indi- 
viduality has come to me. 

God's infinite purpose included my existence and 
my existence just as it is, with all the acts and 
thoughts and purposes which ever have been or ever 
can be a part thereof. This is as true of you as it is 
true of me. It is just as true of all that long line of 
ancestors whom God has used back to the very begin- 
ning of the race, in bestowing life and character upon 
us, as it is true of us. God's universe with all that 
it contains or ever can contain is nothing but an out- 
growth of God's infinite purpose whereby he called it 



162 THE BOOK OF JOB 

and ns into existence and whereby we live and move 
and think and purpose and act and die and thereafter 
live again. 

Environment is not much less powerful in the 
development of spiritual exaltation than is heredity. 
We have said that environment is of man's making. 
This is true in what we might term a secondary sense. 
Man can make and can change his own environment, 
but he can neither make nor change it so as to vary 
that environment from what God foreknew that it 
would be, therefore he is powerless to vary or to 
change the influences which God foreknew would be 
brought to bear upon him and upon others by reason 
of environment. The being whom God creates is des- 
tined to be subjected to certain influences springing 
from environment. Foreknowing these influences, the 
character of the individual is builded in infinite wis- 
dom, by and through hereditary selection, to respond 
to such predetermined environment. When a char- 
acter has been thus prepared for an environment and 
an environment has been predetermined for a char- 
acter, there can be no uncertainty as to that which 
follows. The law of cause and effect then becomes 
operative in the development of character and in the 
production of thought, of purpose and of action. Like 
causes produce like effects under like and equal con- 
trolling influences. In every case infinite wisdom 
foreknows the causes, the controlling influences and 
the strength of such influences, therefore infinite wis- 
dom knows what the thoughts, the purposes, the acts 
of every creature will be, before the thoughts, the pur- 
poses and the acts of the creature have an existence, 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 163 

yea, before the creature himself has an existence. In 
this manner God forms the character to fit the envi- 
ronment which man creates by his own will and acts, 
and which God foreknew he would thus create. It is 
thus that our former assertion is sustained, that 
heredity and environment are the two most powerful 
influences which God uses in controlling his universe 
of created intelligent existence. 

Human suffering in its relation to spiritual 
development has been treated so fully in preceding 
pages that we will not refer to it again in this con- 
nection. 

Human relationships are different. We have not 
treated of them or of their influence upon spiritual 
development at length, and for that reason will now 
consider them. By human relationships we mean 
those of consanguinity and those of association. 
That which is applicable to one is not always 
applicable to the other. The influences of family ties 
and associations are not always the strongest and 
most potent in results. In fact we believe that they 
are rarely so. There is a sense of duty, a sense of 
honor, a sense of self respect towards existing society, 
which make family ties powerful incentives to action ; 
but those relationships which are founded originally 
upon association but have their growth in and are per- 
fected by congeniality of character are the most 
potent of the two classes. Sameness in hopes, fears 
and aspirations ; in desires, purposes and actions, bind 
human lives together in bonds which eternity alone 
has power to sever. The influences springing from 
such united human lives are endless. Over these 



164 THE BOOK OF JOB 

influences eternity itself has no power. In the fore- 
going sentences I make the first reference to an 
unpleasant truth which has been apparent to me for 
a long period and which I am now loath to assert. 

Human relationships, human associations, and the 
pleasures which spring from them, are of earth-life 
alone. They exist in earth as a necessity. They cease 
to exist when the earthly necessity for them ends. 
The influences which flow from them are unending, 
but the relationships themselves and the pleasures 
which flow from them end with human death. It is 
not a pleasant thought that those who are nearest 
and dearest to us now will be in spiritual existence 
no more to us than those who are now unknown. The 
human heart repels this truth and it is right that it 
should. The thought is not given to be accepted, 
and I would not have it accepted until it shall have 
been forced upon each by the acceptance of other 
truths which compel the acceptance of this one. It 
has been thus forced upon me, resisting all the while. 
Solitary and alone God exists in a unity which em- 
braces all individuality. Solitary and alone the soul 
of man shall exist in a unity which is independent 
of all individuality. By this I mean to say that it 
is the destiny of the redeemed human soul to approach 
nearer unto, and to grow into, the solitarity of God's 
own existence as it grows into spiritual knowledge. 
The soul thus grows into a relationship towards all 
other intelligent creatures which shall ever approach 
in closer resemblance that relationship which God 
himself bears towards them. That relationship is 
one of equal and unvarying love towards all, equal 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 165 

and unvarying interest in all, whether they be re- 
deemed or be lost. As we grow into spiritual knowl- 
edge this truth will be forced upon us until its 
acceptance shall be complete. Human relationships 
are a necessity in human life and to them we owe 
much of what we are and shall forever owe much of 
what we shall be. Their influence is not only power- 
ful in earth-life, but it is everlasting. Who of us 
does not now owe much of his soul's hopes and happi- 
ness or of his soul's doubts, fears and unhappiness, 
to such relationships! I for one can affirm that I 
owe all that now incites and inspires my spiritual 
being, to such relationships. The influences of them 
have saved me from spiritual death by pointing out 
to me the way of spiritual life. 

We next take up the thought of human death and 
its influence upon spiritual exaltation. The thought 
of death is ever present with the human race. 
Whether its contemplation brings hope or terror, it 
leads to the thought of spiritual existence, of spir- 
itual powers, of spiritual knowledge. Thoughts along 
these lines lead to desires and desires are followed 
by actions. It is thus that death aids spiritual 
development. Spiritual development leads to spir- 
itual exaltation in those for whom God decreed it. 
Death itself is not the cause of spiritual development, 
whether such development comes before or after 
death has been experienced. It simply turns the 
thoughts towards such development and incites to 
that effort which is necessary for it. We have there- 
fore nothing to say of death as a physical phe- 
nomenon. It is only as an incitement to a desire for 



166 THE BOOK OF JOB 

spiritual knowledge that we consider it. We long to 
know something of the life that our own loved ones 
live after that they have passed through death into 
the spiritual realm. This longing is followed by an 
effort to acquire such knowledge. Such effort is 
along one of two lines, either a study of God's writ- 
ten revelation and the truths contained therein, or a 
study of the physical phenomenon of death, and of 
such physical and spiritual phenomena as may follow 
it. That there are phenomena following death, and 
partaking of a physical and a spiritual nature need 
be neither asserted nor denied. Those who believe 
in them would not surrender that belief because of 
a denial of their existence, and those who disbelieve 
in such phenomena would not believe because of an 
assertion that they do exist. I will therefore neither 
assert nor deny that such phenomena exist. I have 
asserted, and I adhere to this assertion, that the 
physical phenomena which are said to have spiritual 
origin have no such origin. All physical phenomena 
exist because of and under physical laws, and these 
laws are not subject to the control of disembodied 
spirits. It is, however, true that spirit can act upon 
spirit whether one or both are within or without the 
body. Spirit within the body can take cognizance of 
physical laws, through its physical connection with 
such laws. It being true that spirit out of the body 
can influence spirit in the body, and that spirit in the 
body may take cognizance of physical laws through 
its physical connection with such laws, it thus be- 
comes possible that in this indirect manner a dis- 
embodied spirit may use or may exert influence over 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 167 

physical laws and physical phenomena. It is not 
really its own use or its own cognizance of such laws 
and of such phenomena but it is and must always be 
the embodied spirit's use and cognizance of them. My 
former assertion, therefore, stands unimpaired by 
this one. While all this is true, it is not all of the 
truth. The embodied spirit may be so influenced by 
the disembodied spirit that its eyes may be opened. 
By this expression I do not mean to say that it may 
see as disembodied spirits see, for disembodied spirits 
do not see at all, in our use of the term sight; but 
rather that a mental image is impressed upon the 
mind of the spirit still embodied, by the mind of the 
spirit disembodied. Such impression becomes to the 
soul impressed, a mental image as real to it as 
would be the same impression received from an actual 
physical existence. A real physical object simply 
produces a mental impression upon the soul while still 
embodied. Such impressions are made through the 
medium of the organs of vision. A similar impres- 
sion may be made directly by another soul, not 
through the organs of sight, but despite them. The 
mental impression which we call sight or vision may 
therefore be produced in two ways: First, by the 
natural use of the organs of vision. It is, then, 
dependent upon a real object corresponding with 
the mental impression. Second, it may be produced 
by a second mind controlling the mind impressed. 
In this case it is not dependent upon the existence 
of any real or physical object corresponding with 
the mental impression; in fact no such real object 
exists. These are phenomena which are not unusual, 



168 THE BOOK OF JOB 

which are not disputed, and which have come under 
the observation of many of us. The impressed mind 
is said to be in a hypnotic, or in a semi-hypnotic 
state. This hypnotic or semi-hypnotic state may be 
induced by another or it may be self-induced, either 
consciously or unconsciously. All this is evidenced 
by the powers and the tricks of fakirs and jugglers 
as well as by the professional hypnotist. The uncon- 
scious hypnotic or semi-hypnotic state, whether self- 
induced or induced by another, is responsible for 
that class of phenomena which is largely attributed 
to the powers and the influence of disembodied spirits. 
It figures from the beginning to the end of the 
inspired record of miracles. I say this reverently 
and with full belief in the truth of these records 
in so far as that they express correctly the mental 
impressions made upon those who saw and heard. 
This thought cannot be enlarged upon here, inas- 
much as it has been heretofore considered in part 
and will be made the subject of another paper. 

From the foregoing I will assert that when the 
spiritual vision is opened, it means this : that the soul 
whose spiritual vision is opened is in a hypnotic state, 
either self-induced or induced by another soul, and 
that the inducing so,ul, when another, may be either 
within or without a human body. Spiritual exalta- 
tion is, therefore, a hypnotic state. When it is self- 
induced it is assumed to be natural, when it is induced 
by another soul, whether within or without a human 
body, it is assumed to be unnatural. These assump- 
tions are only true in part. Self -induced hypnotism 
is not a natural function of any of the powers of 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 169 

the soul. It is an acquired power, arising from 
unnatural, or rather extra natural, conditions. It is 
spiritual illumination when purely and properly 
acquired and directed. It is demoniacal power when 
improperly and impurely acquired and directed. It 
will certainly lead its possessor to one of these 
extremes. Death alone will reveal to man the mystery 
declared by the universal prevalence of demoniacal 
possession and the extreme rarity of spiritual exalta- 
tion. The explanation rests upon a spiritual law. 
The spiritual law exists because of a necessity for its 
existence. That necessity cannot be comprehended in 
earth, and hence cannot be accepted by any save by 
those who have attained unto spiritual exaltation, and 
by such it cannot be doubted. That necessity stands 
for all time between heaven and earth as an impass- 
able gulf, and the failure to recognize and accept it, 
coupled with the exercise of the powers of the soul 
which I have described, bridges the gulf between earth 
and hell. That necessity, and the law which rests 
upon it, render it impossible for me to receive one 
thought from the soul of my own father or of my 
own mother, now in heavenly life, even as they were 
before they left the earth, or to give to them one 
thought from myself or from earth-life. The power 
exists in them as it does in me. The purpose to exert 
that power will never exist in either, for that pur- 
pose in either, with knowledge of that necessity and 
of that law, would be sin. While this is true, yet 
God's infinite purpose is above both that necessity 
and that law, and to whom he wills it, he applies that 
supreme and infinite purpose, not to the breaking of 



170 THE BOOK OF JOB 

the law, but to the overruling of the necessity. The 
conditions upon which alone this is done have been 
repeatedly referred to in these writings and will not 
be repeated. With this I have said all concerning 
spiritual exaltation which is given to me to say, all 
that is permitted to me to say, all that would be 
understood if declared. I have been forced to say 
this much in order to declare that state of spiritual 
exaltation into which Job was raised through phys- 
ical, mental and spiritual suffering. The revelation 
of the Book of Job could not be declared and less 
than the foregoing be said, otherwise it never would 
have been written. 



CHAPTER IX. 

god's purpose is infinite.— god is in all we do, in 
all we seek to do, and in all we fail to do.— he 
bestows and withholds without regard to 
moral character.— man is created as life below 
him is created.— inert matter is created by 
same law.— the spiritual is all that is superior 

IN MAN. 

The purpose of God is infinite ; it is changeless, and 
it is being fulfilled by us in our individual lives. 
The purpose of God is infinite. What does this mean ? 
It means that there is a purpose that governs all that 
occurs in all the universe; that it is impossible that 
anything should occur in all the universe, that is not 
in accord with this purpose. This purpose is not 
limited to human life, human thought, human desires, 
human purposes, but it extends to all that manifests 
life below man, and to all intelligences superior to 
man. Extending downward, it includes and covers 
every instinctive act of every individual of every 
species wherein life is manifested even for an instant 
of time. Extending upwards it includes and covers 
every thought, every desire, and every purpose of 
every creature manifesting intelligent existence. We 
have been speaking of life governed by volition; we 
now turn to life without volition. Such life down to 

171 



172 THE BOOK OF JOB 

every blade of grass or to every leaf which springs 
into existence is included in this infinite purpose. 
Going one step lower, that inert matter which mani- 
fests no life had a beginning and is subject to con- 
stant change. The beginning or the formation of 
such matter and the changes therein which are as 
constant as are the changes in matter manifesting 
life, are each and all included in and covered by that 
infinite purpose, whether such changes be those made 
by the forces of natural law or those made by the will 
of man. All this multiplied by the unending exist- 
ence of created intelligence, by the unending existence 
in oblivion of manifested life, and by the unending 
changes of created matter, carries us as far towards 
a comprehension of that infinite purpose as the mind 
of man has power to go. We can express these 
thoughts in words, we can follow the thoughts with 
our mental powers towards the conclusion which they 
declare, but we can never grasp that conclusion. It 
lies beyond the realm of human thought. It belongs 
to the infinite. 

With the foregoing as the basis for our thoughts 
let us now consider what God himself said unto Job. 
It may be divided into the following subjects or lines 
of thought: 

First. God is in all we do, in all we seek to do, 
and in all we fail to do. 

Second. God bestows and withholds without re- 
gard to the moral character of the recipient. 

Third. God creates man as he creates manifold 
life below man. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 173 

Fourth. God creates inert matter and governs it 
by the same law by which he creates and governs man, 
and m anifested life below man. 

Fifth. Man's spiritual nature is all that there is 
of man which is superior to the creatures below him, 
or superior to inanimate matter, and this superiority 
applies only to his existence after death. 

First. We are God's creatures. We do his will; 
we do also our own will. These two assertions are 
not contradictory in the least degree. They are each 
absolutely true, and always must continue to be true. 
As we are powerless to go counter to God's purpose 
and will so are we free to do our own will and ever 
shall be thus free. All this rests upon our oft-re- 
peated assertion that God by foreknowledge has him- 
self purposed according as he foreknew we would 
ourselves purpose and act. It is thus that God gov- 
erns his universe without one conflicting thought, 
purpose or act, on the part of any one of his creatures. 
When we have comprehended these truths then we 
are prepared to accept the assertion which constitutes 
the first subdivision of our present theme, to-wit, 
That God is in all we do, in all we seek to do, and in 
all we fail to do. This thought is not new, it is not 
hidden, and it is only strange to one who has failed 
to contemplate it. There cannot be two powers gov- 
erning in God's universe. There is but one God and 
all power has its origin in his will. If any other 
source of power existed in his universe, then there 
could not be harmony therein. Two independent 
sources of original power existing in the universe is 
an impossibility, because an original source of power 



174 THE BOOK OF JOB 

can exist only in a God, and there is but one God. 
In other words, to possess or to constitute an original 
source of power is an attribute of Deity, and of Deity 
alone. No creature can possess such an attribute. All 
the power that any creature can exert is a bestowed 
power. A bestowed power can only be exerted sub- 
ject to the conditions upon which it is bestowed. God 
bestows power upon his creatures with an absolute 
freedom to use it as they will to use it, but in bestow- 
ing it, God foreknows the uses they will make of it, 
down to every thought and purpose and word and 
act of the endless existence of the recipient. There- 
fore the source of all power is one infinite and eternal 
God to whom all other intelligent beings bear the 
relation of creatures, and from whom they have 
received all the power that they exercise, control or 
influence. God bestows powers upon his creatures 
and permits their use, but foreknowing the use that 
these creatures will make of these powers it becomes 
impossible for them to use these powers against or 
contrary to the purpose of God when he bestowed 
them. There is therefore no personal antagonistic 
power of evil warring against the infinite purpose of 
God. There is a power in all intelligent creatures to 
antagonize God by disobeying him and such power 
was bestowed upon them by God himself, according to 
the infinite purpose whereby they were created. God 
then creates and bestows a power which is used 
against himself and which he foreknew, at the time of 
its creation and bestowal, would be so used. This 
would appear to be an impossibility were it not the 
truth, known and accepted, that the everlasting hap- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 175 

piness of a creature can only be attained through the 
possession and control of such a power. 

When we comprehend this truth, as some of us 
certainly do, then we may comprehend also how 
God mercifully and lovingly bestows upon his crea- 
tures this power to contend against and to antago- 
nize himself. 

Second. Such power is bestowed without regard 
to the manner in which it will be used, that is, 
without regard to the moral character which is to 
be developed by its recipient. The nature of the 
power thus bestowed is such that its use is abso- 
lutely free on the part of the recipient. The object 
of its bestowal can only be attained by and through 
such absolute freedom. The number who shall use 
such power in harmony with God's law is neces- 
sarily limited. This truth we have fully considered 
elsewhere. It therefore follows that the power of 
independent thought, desire, purpose and action is 
bestowed alike upon all, whether they shall use it 
in harmony with or against the law of God. It is 
precisely the same gift to each and all. When this 
truth has been accepted then we are prepared to 
accept the further truth that human prosperity and 
human adversity are wholly independent of human 
morality, unless the prosperity or the adversity be 
the direct effect of physical acts. The law of cause 
and effect is not varied by this truth, but subject 
to this law the moral character of the human crea- 
ture is not an element which varies or enters into 
the prosperity, the adversity or the physical suffer- 
ing of the individual. We may sin and be pros- 



176 THE BOOK OF JOB 

perous; we may sin and escape physical suffering; 
but in doing so we must not violate the universal 
law of cause and effect. We may refrain from all 
sin and suffer adversity; we may refrain from all 
sin and endure the extremes of physical suffering. 
In neither case would our moral character have any- 
thing to do with that which came to us, so long as 
we did not place ourselves under this one law. If 
it were not so, how could the consciously moral and 
upright bear their burden of adversity and suffer- 
ing, and at the same time accept and believe the 
infinite love of the Father, and that infinite justice 
which is a part thereof? If it were not so, how 
could the consciously wicked and unjust ever be 
led to accept and believe in an infinitely just God? 
Their own experience would be a bar to such belief. 
Moral character is not of earth or of earthly life a 
part. It belongs to the spiritual nature of man 
alone, and its power is spiritual and spiritual alone. 
Man in his human life and in all that pertains to 
it is an animal, purely and solely; created by and 
under the same law which called lower animal life 
into existence, and subject to and governed by the 
same laws which govern such lower existence. 
Man's moral character attaches to and is a part of 
his spiritual nature, and belongs to this nature 
alone. It cannot govern, control or affect his 
human or animal nature save as it does so through 
the law of cause and effect. This law is universal 
in its application and builds up and accumulates, 
or tears down and scatters, for the lower orders of 
animal life, just the same as it does for the highest 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 177 

order, man. The only difference is in the measure 
of its application, for while the animal, man, with 
his reason, applies it to meet his necessities accord- 
ing to the degree of his intelligence, so do the lower 
orders of animals, wherein reason has waned into 
instinct, apply it according to the degree of such 
instinct. 

Third. These thoughts lead us to our third sub- 
division. God creates man as he creates manifested 
life below man. All life is a manifestation of God's 
life, therefore, all life is akin. To me this is not 
a repulsive thought. If to me my own conscious 
life and powers reveal the infinite life and powers 
of God, in whose image and likeness I am created, 
and if to me the manifested life of the lower or- 
ders reveals that same infinite life of God, then far 
from me be it to deny the kinship of my own life 
with their manifested life. It is the kinship of crea- 
tion, not the kinship of generation, when that term 
is used in the sense of an agency. It is a kin- 
ship which must own the same infinite source of 
being, the same ultimate Father, the same infinite 
purpose, the same creative power, and a sameness 
in the one essential quality of life. This essential 
quality of life is its manifestation of God's own 
life to such of his intelligent creatures as seek to 
know him. There can be no other certain reason 
assigned why God in his infinite wisdom has cre- 
ated life. There can be no other reason required 
than this one, which covers all inquiries and satis- 
fies all longings respecting it. Created life, then, 
whether it be the highest or the lowest manifes- 



178 THE BOOK OF JOB 

tation of it, is one and the same in essence and 
in kind. It varies only in character and in en- 
dowment. "With this thought in mind, let us con- 
template man in his relations to life above and to 
life below him. Man's life, spiritually, is kindred 
to all created life above him, and is subject to and is 
governed by the same laws, without exception, as is 
such life. This thought need not be followed fur- 
ther, as it is not within the limit of this argument. 
It is of kindred life below man's life that we speak. 
The range of manifested life from man's as the 
highest, down to the lowest physical manifestation 
of life, is that of which we now speak. It is this 
of which we assert that it is one and the same in 
essence and in kind. The laws which apply to one 
form or degree of this range of life apply equally 
to all forms and degrees of the same. This is true 
of the laws which govern its birth, the laws which 
govern its suffering, and the laws which govern its 
death. This whole range of life exists because of 
one and the same necessity for its existence. It 
ceases to exist as manifested life because of one and 
the same necessity that it should so cease, to wit, 
the physical form through which it is manifested. 
If, among the lower orders, we see revealed a law 
of life for such order, we mayrest in the full assur- 
ance that that same law of life applies to all other 
orders within this range, in so far as it is applica- 
ble to their physical condition. Character alone is 
superior to such law of life, for the reason that 
character precedes any possible application of such 
law. Such law becomes effective only subject to 



AN INSPIRED DKAMA 179 

character which is bestowed with the gift of life. 
To illustrate such laws of life aud their application 
to the human order of life, we mention that one 
which governs the increase and the decrease of the 
several orders of life. In the period of the world's 
existence no one order has been permitted to so 
increase as to overrun the earth, or to become ex- 
tinct until the purpose of its creation had been ful- 
filled. These results are not of chance; they are of 
law. Whether the apparent cause has been the fail- 
ure of food supply, the development of disease, or 
the introduction and growth or other antagonistic 
and destructive orders, the excess of every order 
has come to a hastened or untimely death. Has this 
been true of the human order? History declares 
the answer in unmistakable terms. Wars, pestilence, 
famine, death, as experienced by the human order, 
is but a duplication of that which comes to every 
lower order of animal life. Not only so, but they 
come by the same law and in fulfillment of the same 
infinite purpose. The means and the methods of 
depopulating the earth are as sure and as certain 
in their operation as are the methods of populating 
it, and will continue as long. 

There is another law of life, stamped by nature 
upon every order of physically manifested life. It 
is given expression in the thought that the most 
highly developed and the strongest of each order 
survive for the longest time and in the greatest num- 
ber the less highly developed and the weaker of the 
same order. This is revealed as a law of life to 
all who study life along the lines we have indi- 



180 THE BOOK OF JOB 

cated. Is this true of the human order? Again, 
history answers that this is true of man. The third 
illustration is not so plain to all, but we will ex- 
press it thus: Usurpation of power by one order 
or family over another order or family leads eventu- 
ally to the destruction of the usurping order or 
family. The law of life which is revealed by this 
truth might be thus expressed: The undue multi- 
plication or preponderance of any one order or 
family destroys the equilibrium of manifested life. 
Life was created in equilibrium and must return 
to equilibrium whenever that is destroyed. There 
is no exception to this law. There is an apparent 
exception. Whenever any order or family has ful- 
filled the purposes of its creation such order or fam- 
ily ceases to exist. It becomes extinct, and the truth 
of its existence is buried in the earth which nur- 
tured and sustained it, or is lost to those for whom 
its existence is useless. This is true of races or fami- 
lies of man; it is true of orders and families below 
man. That which has fulfilled the purpose of its 
creation ceases to exist. This is the highest law of 
life, so plainly revealed that none can question it. 
Subject to this law, that other law, our third illus- 
tration, is universal in its application. Does the 
history of the human order sustain this law also? 
We assert that it does, and leave it to the thought 
of each to concur or to reject this truth. We there- 
fore find that whenever any degree, order or fam- 
ily of manifested life, by its increase or by its de- 
struction, destroys the equilibrium in which such life 
was created, there is reaction towards that equilib- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 181 

rium. Apply this law as you may, its truth becomes 
apparent throughout the ages. 

In the destruction of human life and of the 
lower orders of life we find, then, one and the same 
law working, irrespective of the degree of life de- 
stroyed. Man is swept from the earth by the thou- 
sands, by the tens of thousands, by the hundreds of 
thousands, and no law of life under which man ex- 
ists is violated. Dispensation of Providence and the 
inscrutable mystery of God's will are the satisfying 
solution whereby the great majority comfort them- 
selves when these facts are contemplated. It were 
better to designate it thus: The laws of life under 
which man has his human existence call for deple- 
tion as surely as for multiplication of human life. 
Equilibrium must be maintained in the human order 
as surely as it is maintained in the lower orders of 
manifested life, and it as surely will be maintained. 
Equilibrium, thus used, means what? We would de- 
fine it to be that number of individuals in any 
one order or family of manifested life which best 
fulfills the purpose for which such order or family 
was created. In the lower orders we can readily 
comprehend this as a truth. The undue multipli- 
cation of any one order (and sometimes of any one 
subdivision of an order) destroys the equilibrium of 
life and works an injury to all other forms of life. 
Illustrations of this truth in great number may be 
drawn from the ordinary animal and insect life with 
which we are familiar. When this same law is ap- 
plied to man in his human existence it staggers us; 
we doubt it; we deny it; and there is nothing left 



182 THE BOOK OF JOB 

for us but this same dispensation of Providence and 
inscrutable mystery of God's will, of which we 
spoke. There is no dispensation of Providence out- 
side of that dispensation which established the laws 
of life under which all created life exists. There 
are no inscrutable mysteries of God's will, save such 
as are expressed in these same laws. God's laws are 
changeless and everlasting. They strike me down 
and let you live, or let me live and strike you down, 
by that decree and purpose whereby they were estab- 
lished, and not by any subsequent act of the will of 
the infinite God. Nations are swept from the earth; 
peoples perish; races, even, become extinct; and it 
is all in accordance with that inexorable law under 
which life was bestowed upon them. One nation 
rises into power and demonstrates one phase of an 
ultimate universal civilization. It can do no more; 
it was built up by and along one line of thought, one 
ambition, one national purpose. In this it was 
strong, stronger than any other, and may be stronger 
than all others combined. In other respects it is 
weak; may be weaker than any other. In that 
wherein it is strong it becomes aggressive, dominant, 
masterful. It teaches to the world one lesson; it 
demonstrates its one truth, and it establishes for- 
ever its one principle, which thus becomes and shall 
forever remain a component part of the ultimate 
civilization towards which the human race pro- 
gresses. Having done this, that nation has served 
the purpose of its creation. It decays, it perishes, 
and its completed work alone remains to reveal the 
infinite wisdom which decreed its existence. Are 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 183 

we speaking now outside of the world's historic rec- 
ords ? Let us see if we can read this law in anything 
that is past ? One nation came into being whose com- 
posite thought seemed to hover about poetry, logic, 
rhetoric, sculpture and art in all their varied forms 
of expression; in fact that composite thought gave 
expression to perfection in art, and to the fullest 
development of the intellectual powers yet attained. 
That people gave to the world its lesson, never to be 
repeated, and passed out of existence. Another rose, 
developed and matured upon the single thought of 
power, political power, dominion, tyrannical suprem- 
acy of the few over the many. The world lay at 
its feet in conquered obedience. Its lesson had been 
taught, its work was finished; the truths, the illus- 
trations, founded upon this thought and which are 
required for the ultimate civilization, had been be- 
stowed by it, and it passed away. Other nations 
have grown up and matured, or are growing up 
and maturing, guided by a religious creed as a cen- 
tral and solidifying thought. They give expression 
to their creed; they teach the world the lessons of 
it; they illustrate its value or its harm, and all they 
are and all they do, by and through its influence 
and continuing illustration, w T ill enter into and be- 
come a part of that ultimate civilization of which 
we speak. Another nation has come into existence, 
begotten of and sustained and nourished by the com- 
posite thought, belief and claim of individual lib- 
erty, individual rights, individual independence, as 
against all other human beings. Nourished and fat- 
tened by a desire and a purpose sweet to the taste 



184 THE BOOK OF JOB 

of every man of every race and nation and people, 
it has already grown to proportions approaching un- 
wieldiness. It, too, is teaching its lesson ; it is illus- 
trating a truth and the workings and influences of 
that truth. Its work is not yet done, but its work 
surely will be finished, and then it, too, shall pass 
away; pass away as all other nations founded upon 
a distinctive thought and purpose have passed away, 
leaving to the world one of the profoundest lessons 
of all that shall enter into this ultimate perfected civ- 
ilization, which lesson shall teach the farthest limit 
to which individual liberty, individual freedom, in- 
dividual independence may be carried, and the 
point where these must be merged into the liberty, 
freedom and independence of society as a whole. 
This ultimate civilization shall become and be the 
outgrowth of all that shall have preceded it. 

Fourth. God creates inert matter and governs 
it by the same law by which he creates and governs 
man and manifested life below man. In the mate- 
rial world there is one law for the living and for 
the dead; for that which is created to manifest life 
and for that which is created to sustain life. These 
two classes include everything that now exists, every- 
thing that has been created and everything that shall 
be created. To manifest life and thereby reveal the 
Creator to his intelligent creatures, as infinite in his 
attributes of power and wisdom, is the purpose of 
your existence and of my existence, as well as the 
purpose of all else that does exist. He who seeks 
beyond this for a reason for the creation of anything 
is doomed to disappointment. No other reason ex- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 185 

ists that can be known to man, because if any other 
reason did exist the perfect revelation of God to 
man would have included the revelation of it. 
Therefore, to manifest life or to sustain manifested 
life, covers all that we may know concerning the 
reasons for the creation of all things of which we 
have knowledge. What is, therefore, created to mani- 
fest life and what is created to sustain manifested 
life? This question is answered by that which we 
may see and may know concerning natural law. If 
we turn our thoughts to this subject we will imme- 
diately perceive the truth that many creatures both 
manifest life and also sustain other forms of mani- 
fested life. Therefore we will conclude that there 
is a law of life which might be thus expressed: To 
manifest life is but one of the conditions upon which 
life is bestowed ; to surrender that life to perpetuate 
the manifestation of the same or of other forms of 
life is another condition of equal force. Among the 
lower orders this truth is so manifest that it needs 
no argument in declaring it. This law is most 
clearly revealed to man by its operations among the 
lower forms of life. If, however, we recognize and 
accept it as a law applicable tc the lower orders, then 
we must accept and apply it equally to man. This 
we want to do. Man's life is bestowed upon these 
two conditions and they are of equal force when 
applied to him. If God's purpose concerning man, 
the perpetuation, the development, the civilization 
of his race, requires the sacrifice of one or of one 
million human lives they are taken, just as are taken 
the lives of the lower orders of creatures. This is 



186 THE BOOK OF JOB 

true of man's life in the aggregate and it is true of 
man's life in the individual. The law of life is 
the same in each case and for all. There is no 
death, either of a human being or of a creature 
lower than human, that is not according to God's 
will and purpose, and that is not required under 
the law by which the creature holds its life. In 
like manner, that which is created for the purpose 
of sustaining manifested life, continues or perishes 
by the same law, the law of necessity, according to 
the infinite purpose of God. We call this change 
death when it is applied to that which manifests 
life; we call it destruction when it is applied to 
that which is inanimate. In either case it is change, 
simply. Death is change in the same sense that the 
destruction of inanimate matter is change. It is in 
this broad, yet true, sense that man dies as the 
brute dies, and that the brute dies as inanimate 
matter is destroyed. One law alone governs all these 
results; the law of change, necessitated by the in- 
finite purpose of God. By this law a world is brought 
into existence, endures for its period and passes 
away through change. It is not destroyed, it is 
changed. There is no destruction, either in that 
which is spirit or in that which is matter. 

Fifth. Man's spiritual nature is all that there 
is of man which is superior to the creatures below 
him or superior to inanimate matter, and this supe- 
riority applies only to his existence after death. 
Death is the springing of the spiritual nature of 
man. It is not the flower. That must come by the 
development of that nature after death. Human 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 187 

conditions and the material existence are incompati- 
ble with the development of the spritiual nature. 
It exists through these and in spite of them may 
make some growth, but such growth is not and 
cannot be so great as to controvert the declaration 
that death is really the springing of the spiritual 
in man and that the flowering of the spiritual nature 
lies far beyond the hour of a man's death. If this 
be true, then what is the ripened fruitage of a man's 
spiritual life? To answer this question as far as it 
is possible for us to answer it, is our purpose now. 
In doing this we must bear in mind that we all 
deal with that which lies far beyond our own experi- 
ence, therefore, we can only reason by analogy from 
that which we have experienced up to that which 
it is possible for us to experience. If we know God 
now and know him by the exercise of powers of the 
possession of which we are self-conscious, and if we 
use these powers under a changeless law of the ex- 
istence of which we are also conscious through our 
own experience, then we can safely assert that be- 
fore us lies a continuous use of these same powers, 
under this same changeless law. In this manner we 
can safely anticipate that which we shall surely ex- 
perience, although now wholly unable to experience 
it. In this manner we are enabled to declare some- 
thing of that which lies before all who will stead- 
fastly and untiringly seek to know and comprehend 
God 's revealed truths through the normal use of these 
spiritual powers, with which they are endowed. 
What these powers are we have so fully declared 
elsewhere that we will not now repeat it. How they 



183 THE BOOK OF JOB 

are used and the effect of their use we have also 
fully considered. There remains, therefore, for this 
article nothing to be considered other than a forecast 
of the effects which will surely follow the use of these 
powers after that death shall have made such use 
the normal and highest function of the soul. The use 
of these powers in human life is a constrained use, 
an obstructed use, an unnatural use, if that word 
is properly understood. It is against the nature of 
the human being in his human life to use these 
powers, because the human nature is the dominating 
nature and the spiritual the subservient nature. It 
is in this sense alone that Ave use the term unnat- 
ural in the preceding declaration. All this is changed 
by death. The spiritual then becomes not only the 
dominant nature, but, also, after the lapse of a pe- 
riod, at least, the only nature of the soul. If these 
spiritual powers to which we have referred have not 
then been destroyed by the soul's own act, but remain 
to it with a desire to use them, their use then be- 
comes natural, and a failure to use them unnatural. 
For the sake of clearness we must now repeat this 
much. The soul's spiritual powers of obedience and 
worship are destroyed, wholly destroyed, by any one 
act of the soul, which, in itself, is a purposed and 
wilful disobedience to God's law, and, once de- 
stroyed, these powers can never be restored to the 
soul. It is, therefore, only of those souls who have 
never purposely and knowingly and willingly chosen 
disobedience, that we now speak. All those who 
have, at any time, made such choice, have not within 
them any trace of the powers of which we speak 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 189 

or any knowledge of what they are. Such cannot 
receive knowledge through them any more than the 
totally blind can see or the wholly deaf hear, in human 
life. All these, sooner or later, deny the existence 
of such powers. We find, therefore, that, after death, 
souls are divided into two classes. The one class 
retains in some rudimentary or embryotic state of 
development, these spiritual powers of obedience and 
worship; the other class is wholly lacking in them. 
The possession of these powers and the absence of 
these powers from the soul constitute that impass- 
able gulf which separates heaven from hell. It is 
in very truth an impassable gulf, just as impass- 
able as is that gulf in earth-life which separates the 
lovingly obedient and worshipful from the wilfully 
and purposely disobedient. It is neither more nor 
less than this same gulf, unchanged by death. All 
who retain these powers through death use them, 
for it then becomes just as natural to use them as 
it was unnatural to use them in their human exist- 
ence. Those in whom these powers have been de- 
stroyed are not to be further considered in this con- 
nection. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE WAY OF THE SOUL IN LIFE EVERLASTING. 

Before the obedient and worshipful soul lies the 
way which we propose to anticipate, as we may have 
the power to do so. That way will be marked by 
stages, by periods, by degrees. The better to guide 
our thoughts let us call them mile-stones along the 
way of the life everlasting. Human birth is the 
starting point of this way. Human death marks the 
end of the first stage, whether the period of it be 
a moment or a century of time. At death, there- 
fore, we set up the first mile-stone and call it the 
beginning of the second stage of the way of life. The 
second mile-stone we will call Recognition, and it 
shall mark the period of the first distinctive change 
in the spiritual existence. The third mile-stone we 
shall call Illumination, spiritual illumination, 
which is the highest state of which mortals may 
have knowledge. The fourth mile-stone we shall call 
Comprehension, the power of comprehension. The 
fifth mile-stone we shall call Impartation, the power 
to impart knowledge comprehended. The sixth mile- 
stone we shall call Absorption, or oneness with God, 
according to the degree of life manifested by the 
creature. 

That which lies between the beginning and death 
may be much or it may be little. In either case it 

190 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 191 

constitutes the first stage of our existence and is that 
upon which our spiritual existence depends. 

Material existence is the foundation and the only 
support of spiritual existence. Without the former 
the latter cannot be. With the former, however brief 
the period of its duration, the latter cannot fail to 
be. The reason for this assertion belongs to another 
theme. 

We refer to it here simply to emphasize our simile 
of death being the first milestone along the way of 
our unending life. 

Second. Of this first stage we need say no more. 
Passing to the second stage we also pass the bound- 
ary of human experience, that is, of ordinary human 
experience. With this limitation in mind we are 
now to travel in thought over a new way, new in 
reality to us, yet not of necessity wholly new. We 
now deal with the spiritual nature of man and with 
that alone. Our thoughts are not now to be of 
man 's human life or of his physical endowments ; yet 
it is true that man's spiritual nature and his spir- 
itual existence begin with his human birth, are asso- 
ciated with his physical nature and his physical ex- 
istence, and continue as a part of a dual nature and 
a dual existence until death ends this dual state and 
leaves the spiritual as the sole existence. This spir- 
itual existence and this spiritual nature are un- 
changed by death, so that if we comprehend what 
our spiritual nature and our spiritual existence are 
now, then we may surely know what they will be 
after death. For the purposes of this argument we 



392 THE BOOK OF JOB 

take these as axiomatic truths, and so use them. If 
this is error, then our argument falls. It is not 
error. I am fixed in my belief that death makes 
no change whatever in the spiritual nature or in the 
spiritual existence of the soul. If I have not hereto- 
fore shown this, or shall not hereafter show it by 
logical deductions from individual experiences, then 
the fault will be with the individual experience. No 
spiritual truth can be established by logical deduc- 
tion, without experience. All spiritual truths must 
and forever will rest upon indiviual experience as 
their basic support. Logical deduction from this in- 
dividual experience is an aid to their acceptance, 
when the experience in itself is not sufficient to force 
their acceptance upon the soul. Many spiritual 
truths are thus forced upon us. I will not say 
which of these methods has brought me to the un- 
questioning acceptance of these truths, which I here 
assert, and propose to use as axiomatic. It is suffi- 
cient that I have come into this knowledge. 

Death, therefore, makes no change in our spir- 
itual natures or in our spiritual existence. In 
these particulars we are the same one hour after 
death as we were one hour before death. We are 
unchanged in nature, we are unchanged in existence, 
save only that all that is physical, all that pertains 
to the physical, all that is dependent upon the physi- 
cal, drops out of our existence and leaves us just 
as we were immediately preceding death, in all that 
is spiritual, in all that pertains to the spiritual, in 
all that is dependent upon the spiritual. If we are 
in the spiritual state of heaven in our physical ex- 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 193 

istence, we will continue in that same spiritual state 
after death. If we are in the spiritual state of hell 
preceding death we will continue in that same spir- 
itual state after death. Whatever we are before death, 
that we will be after death. While these assertions 
are literally and strictly true, they must not stand 
without some further explanation. Death does not 
change the spiritual state of the soul, but death 
may make any change in that spiritual state impos- 
sible thereafter. If the soul has chosen disobedi- 
ence and passes through death into the spiritual 
state of the disobedient, such soul will be powerless 
to change that state thereafter. Such inability does 
not lie in the unwillingness of God to receive such 
soul into a state of obedience, but it does lie wholly 
in the inability of such soul to emerge from its state 
of disobedience. It has forever destroyed its own 
power to know God. It has no other or further 
evidence of God's existence than it had during its 
human existence. That evidence was insufficient for 
it then and it is doubly so now. Whether this was 
always true is not a question to be now answered. 
That it is true, since the fullness of God's revela- 
tion of himself through the human life and teach- 
ings of Christ, the Son, has been accomplished, we 
have the authority of the Son himself, for asserting. 
Jesus Christ has made this much clear by his teach- 
ing : First, that those who accept him, shall, through 
such acceptance, enter into spiritual life, which is the 
knowledge of the Father, and, second, that those 
who reject him shall thereby enter into spiritual 
death, which is an inability to know the Father, and, 



194 THE BOOK OF JOB 

third, that those who have not a knowledge of him 
sufficient to accept or reject him will not enter either 
of these spiritual states until they have had such 
knowledge and have made such choice. There is, 
therefore, a state of paradise, which is neither heaven 
nor hell, but is the state into which all souls are 
born and out of which they must pass, according to 
their own choice. 

This, therefore, brings me to the following asser- 
tion concerning every soul which passes through 
death into the existence which is wholly spiritual. 
Its spiritual nature, its spiritual powers, and its 
spiritual state are unchanged by death. If it knows 
what its spiritual nature, its spiritual powers, and 
its spiritual state are before death, then it may cer- 
tainly know what each and all of these will be after 
death. If it is ignorant of what these are before 
death then it will continue ignorant of what they are 
during the first stage of the way of its existence after 
death. If it has entered into the state of spiritual 
death before physical death, and is ignorant of 
this truth, as it always is, it will remain ignorant 
thereof after death. Those in the state of spiritual 
death know it not, and deny the existence of any 
spiritual state other than their own. This is true 
before physical death; it will continue true after 
physical death. When physical death comes it will 
add nothing to the knowledge which the soul already 
has of its own spiritual nature, its own spiritual 
powers and its own spiritual state. The spiritual 
remains unchanged, wholly unchanged by death. 
The spiritual in man lies above and beyond the 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 195 

power of physical death to affect it. This plain truth, 
which becomes self-evident to us with matured 
thought, lies at the foundation of our understanding 
of our own spiritual natures. It is true that few 
ever understand their own spiritual natures during 
human life. They cannot accept this truth, or may 
be have never considered the possibility of the ex- 
istence of this truth. Physical death to them is a 
mystery unsolved and unsolvable. It is to their 
thought a great catastrophe, a great cataclysm, 
rending and destroying all the conditions of life, and 
ushering in another world, with other conditions 
wholly unknown. With such views of death no man 
can ever comprehend his own spiritual self. To say 
that death will bring no changes to us is a self- 
evident absurdity, but to say that it will bring no 
changes to our spiritual selves, is or becomes a self- 
evident truth to those who comprehend themselves 
spiritually. This being true, we will awaken from 
the sleep of death, the transition sleep through which 
we must all pass, and which Christ, the Son of God, 
himself could not escape, because of the human na- 
ture which he had assumed, unchanged in all that is 
spiritual within and about us, and unconscious of 
any change save that which pertains to our physical 
life. "We shall know no more of our spiritual selves 
than we knew when we entered this sleep of death. 
"We shall see or comprehend no more clearly what we 
are spiritually or what our spiritual state is. De- 
prived of all the senses, powers and factulties which 
are dependent upon the physical existence for their 
use, we turn to our spiritual selves as being the all of 



196 THE BOOK OF JOB 

us, and thus begin forthwith to comprehend our- 
selves more fully as spiritual beings. This leads to 
the development of those spiritual powers which have 
lain dormant during human life. Our development 
as spiritual being is thus accelerated. As the soul's 
physical senses, faculties and powers come into use 
and are developed through infancy and childhood 
up to matured life, so now, in like manner, the soul's 
spiritual senses, powers and faculties must come into 
use and be developed, even as through a spiritual 
infancy and childhood. However, this spiritual in- 
fancy and childhood need not necessarily be delayed 
until after physical death. It may come in a meas- 
ure greater or less before such death; and it does 
so come to every soul which makes the effort required 
for its spiritual development. "We have thus tried 
to present, in language plain and unmistakable, a 
vital thought which must be accepted in order that 
that which follows may be accepted. 

The soul passes through death and awakens from 
its sleep of death. As it is with one, so is it with 
all. That is, all human creatures cast off the physical 
state in the same manner. The unconscious state is 
itself a variable period, depending upon the indi- 
vidual life preceding death. The greater the spir- 
itual development and the more natural and har- 
monious the human development in all its phases, 
the briefer is the period of unconscious spiritual ex- 
istence. The human life and human development of 
Christ were perfect. His spiritual nature, the out- 
growth and expression of that human life, was also 
perfect. Christ remained in this transition period 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 197 

of spiritual unconsciousness for a period approach- 
ing three days, or consuming parts of three days, 
and thus became the first, the earliest, the quickest 
fruits of the resurrection of a human creature out of 
its transition sleep. No human soul can emerge from 
this transition sleep in any briefer period. How 
much longer the period may be for others is not given 
us to know. We only have the revelation, and 
through it the knowledge, that those who develop 
their spiritual natures in human life through obedi- 
ence and worship have the first, the earliest, the 
quickest resurrection from this state as compared 
with those who do not so develop their spiritual na- 
tures. Resurrection means an awakening into con- 
sciousness from the sleep of death. The sleep of 
death means a period of unconscious spiritual exist- 
ence immediately following the casting off of the 
physical existence. The duration of such period is 
not great, at least there is no revelation which teaches 
us that it is. The limit of the shortness of its dura- 
tion has been fixed by the perfect life, human and 
divine, of the Son of God, and the manifestation 
which he made of himself, through his spiritual resur- 
rection, to his disciples. The opposite extreme of 
the duration of this period would be represented 
by that which is required for a human soul possess- 
ing the lowest possible spiritual development to be- 
come conscious of its spiritual powers after that it 
had been wholly cut off from all knowledge depend- 
ent upon those senses, factulties and powers which 
can only act in conjunction with a material exist- 
ence. We can conceive that human souls have lived 



198 THE BOOK OF JOB 

and do now live, in whom, at death, there exists 
nothing beyond a mere trace, or an embryotic state, 
of all spiritual powers, and of the existence of which 
the soul is wholly unconscious. In such cases this 
sleep of death, this period of unconscious spiritual 
existence, can only be likened to the period of physi- 
cal gestation. Sooner or later every soul awakens 
from this unconscious state by a self-consciousness of 
knowledge brought to it through some one of its 
spiritual senses, powers or faculties. Such knowl- 
edge in the world of spirit must be an individual 
experience. Nothing else to it is knowledge; nothing 
else can be knowledge. It can know that it lives only 
through an individual experience. This comes with- 
out surprise or wonder to those who have developed 
and used their spiritual powers during human life, 
and have received spiritual knowledge through them. 
Such individual experience, in every case, whether 
it comes quickly or whether it be long delayed, is 
the first consciousness of existence after physical 
death. Having thus awakened, development there- 
after depends upon individual effort. If that is lack- 
ing, no development will follow. If the soul obeyed 
and worshiped God in its human life, it will obey 
and worship him from the instant of its conscious 
awakening. If it did not obey and worship God in 
its human life, having knowledge requisite therefor, 
but chose rather to disobey him and do its own will, 
it is powerless now to obey, to worship or to know 
God, because in it the spiritual powers of obedience 
and worship have been destroyed by its own act. It 
is for this reason that there can be no change in the 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 199 

soul's spiritual state after spiritual death, whether 
that occur before or after physical death. If in its 
human life the soul did not have knowledge sufficient 
to enable it to obey and worship, then it was equally 
impossible for it to choose disobedience, and that 
soul remains in the same spiritual state into which 
it entered with the beginning of its existence. It 
will continue in the same state until it possesses such 
knowledge, and, having it, makes such choice. Physi- 
cal death changes not the state of any soul, whatever 
that state may be. Whenever knowledge sufficient 
therefor is possessed in human life, the choice of the 
soul between obedience and worship, or disobedience 
and the doing of its own will, is therein made, and 
the spiritual state of such soul is fixed thereby. 

Growth in spiritual knowledge after death may 
be very slow and it may be very rapid. When no 
knowledge sufficient for choice exists in human life, 
and no spiritual development exists therein, it is 
with great difficulty that the soul can be aroused to 
effort. There is no fear of death before it ; no uncer- 
tainty as to its future existence; no incentives such 
as bear upon all souls yet in human life, to act upon 
it; hence it is harder, much harder, for such soul to 
come into obedience and worship, through its own 
volition, as it must come, if at all. This is what we 
mean and all we mean in all these writings when 
we have referred to the greater difficulty of obedience 
and worship on the part of a soul in the state of 
paradise, after physical death, as compared with a 
soul in the same state before physical death. It is 
true that infinite justice is meted out to all souls, 



200 THE BOOK OF JOB 

whether physical death intervenes or not; but this 
truth does not conflict with the assertions which we 
have heretofore made and the use to which we have 
aimed to put them. It is the duty of every Chris- 
tian to strive to bring this sufficient knowledge to 
every human soul before physical death shall remove 
it from the influences which are powerful during its 
earth-life in determining its choice. 

Whether the period be short or be protracted there 
comes to every soul which passes through physical 
death in the spiritual state of spiritual life, or 
which, after physical death, passes out of the spir- 
itual state of paradise into spiritual life, a period at 
which it recognizes, accepts and makes its own this 
essential spiritual truth, to wit: The God I wor- 
ship is known to me as he only can be known to any 
creature, through my own spiritual powers of wor- 
ship and obedience. I know him by and through 
my own experiences, which come to me as the effect 
of my own worship and obedience, and this is all I 
ever can know of God. God manifests his own ex- 
istence to me by and through these personal experi- 
ences of my own, by and through his infinitely per- 
fect work of creation, and by and through the human 
and spiritual life and the teachings of Jesus Christ, 
his Son. Christ is with me in spirit, and will be 
always, without end. God's Holy Spirit speaks with 
me through my own spiritual nature and powers, 
and ever shall so speak with those who seek his 
presence. With this revelation of God's infinite 
power, through his creation; with this revelation of 
God's infinite wisdom, through his Holy Spirit, and 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 201 

with this revelation of God's infinite love, through 
Jesus Christ, his Son, I am satisfied, satisfied, SAT- 
ISFIED. In this satisfaction I am wholly happy 
and will ever worship and obey my God, who, being 
invisible, is thus clearly seen by me. At this point 
on our way of life we set up its second mile-stone, 
marking the end of its second stage. 

Third. From this point we enter upon the third 
stage, that of which the end is spiritual illumination. 
Of this stage only do I hesitate to speak. It involves 
so much which might appear to be personal claims 
that I must deny and dispel such claims even before 
the thought of them arises. I make no claim to spir- 
itual illumination, in the sense in which I now treat 
it. Claims, as well as disclaimers, are alike worth- 
less. The truth that is spoken and the thought which 
is recorded are the only support upon which any 
such claim or any such disclaimer can rest. The 
spirit which is breathed through the spoken or the 
written words is the sole proof of claims to spiritual 
understanding. 

Recognition, as we have just defined it, is the 
foundation of, and is, in itself, the beginning of 
spiritual illumination. The latter cannot come with- 
out the former, yet it does not necessarily follow 
close upon the former. The soul may recognize the 
essential truths we have outlined and rest content 
therein. Such is the will of many, but it will not 
always be their will. The soul of man, endowed with 
a likeness to the powers of God, cannot always rest 
satisfied with spiritual recognition alone. The exist- 
ence of such powers becomes a self-conscious truth. 



202 THE BOOK OF JOB 

The desire to use all self-conscious powers is bestowed 
as a part of the power itself, upon all creatures. 
Such desire ends in purpose and the purpose begets 
action. It is action, use, that develops the powers. 
Spiritual illumination is just as impossible without 
individual effort as would be the attainment of the 
highest physical knowledge without such effort. It 
cannot be imparted; it must be imbibed; it must 
come as a growth, a development. It is the effect, 
of which personal effort, under individual instruc- 
tion, is the cause. This is not saying that personal 
effort alone, without individual instruction, could not 
produce spiritual illumination, for it is certainly true 
that the soul could thus grow into it, but such growth 
would resemble in slowness the growth of physical 
sciences under like conditions. The soul of man is 
not left to itself alone in its struggle to solve the 
infinite mysteries and truths of its own and of its 
Creator's existence. It is aided to the limit of its 
ability to comprehend. Its ability to comprehend is 
an ever-increasing power, and the measure of such 
increase is the measure of the soul's individual ef- 
fort. If you can accept this truth of the growth of a 
soul in spiritual understanding, and likewise ear- 
nestly desire such growth you will thereby be led 
into that effort which certainly begets such growth. 
Can this occur in human life? We unhesitatingly 
answer, that, while the conditions and the environ- 
ment are unfavorable therefor in human life, yet 
they do not render it impossible. Spiritual existence 
is our existence now. It is true that it is associated 
with the physical existence in our human life and 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 203 

is the subjective existence while thus associated, yet 
it is also true that these relations may be largely 
modified by temperament, physical organization, de- 
sires, purposes, and the development of the soul's 
spiritual powers, as well as by environment and spe- 
cial conditions, of which we will not speak more 
freely. God works with and upon all his creatures, 
but he does not work with and upon all of them alike. 
He creates life, he endows life, he takes life from 
its human state, according to his own will and for 
his own purposes. This will and these purposes we' 
cannot question and may not always know. If each 
creature will but follow faithfully the revelations of 
God's Holy Spirit to him and make the individual 
effort required therefor, the end will be the same, 
sooner or later. God's revelation is not the same to 
all. It can scarcely be said to be the same to any 
two human beings. Revelation is the office and work 
of the Holy Spirit. To one the Spirit sayeth one 
thing, to another the Spirit sayeth another thing. 
In each case the word is that which is most helpful 
to the soul to be influenced and led. The word is 
suited to the knowledge which the soul possesses, to 
the prejudices which must be combatted and cor- 
rected and to the human environment in which its 
earthly lot is cast. A failure to recognize this truth 
is one of the stumbling blocks which lie in the way 
of him who would teach spiritual truths to human 
souls. The measure of the revelation which has 
been given to one may not be the mesaure of the 
revelation which has been given to his neighbor. 
That which would be sin for one may not be sin for 



204 THE BOOK OF JOB 

another, possessing a different revelation of spiritual 
truth. Sin lies not in the act, it lies in the purpose 
which precedes the act. Holy is he who longs for 
holiness, who purposes holiness and who acts accord- 
ing to the revelation God's Holy Spirit has given 
unto him. Unholy is he who cares not for holiness, 
who does not purpose holiness, and who violates the 
revelation which God's Holy Spirit has given to him. 
This is true, whatever the acts of the one or of the 
other may be. There is but one revelation, but that 
revelation is infinite as are the attributes of God, and 
can never be wholly understood. We understand it 
according to our spiritual development and knowl- 
edge. It meant one thing to us yesterday; it means 
another thing to us today. The meaning today does 
not contradict the meaning of yesterday; it is only 
deeper and broader. Yesterday, to ourselves, the 
meaning of today would have appeared to us as a 
contradiction to the meaning of yesterday. This 
is always true. Our present understanding always 
appears to ourselves as a contradiction of any broader 
or deeper understanding than our own. The reverse 
of this is never true. We look back over the steps or 
stages of our progress up to our present understand- 
ing and we see neither conflict nor contradiction. 
We cannot look forward even one step or stage with- 
out seeing both. We must ourselves advance before 
we can receive and accept revelation as it comes to 
one in advance of ourselves. We must grow and 
believe; we cannot believe and grow. Spiritual 
growth is, therefore, the condition upon which alone 
depends our increased knowledge of God's revelation. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 205 

Is spiritual growth possible in human life ? It is not 
only possible, but it is required of us. If we meet 
this requirement and grow spiritually we cannot es- 
cape, nor hinder, nor lessen this change in our under- 
standing of God's revelation. It comes to us as cer- 
tainly as comes the growth. There is a difference 
between spiritual devotion and spiritual growth. A 
soul may be devoted to the very limit of devotion and 
make no growth. To it there would come no change 
in its understanding of revelation. The thoughts 
and the beliefs of its childhood would be the thoughts 
and the beliefs of its manhood, and these, again, the 
thoughts and the beliefs of its latest years, its devo- 
tion remaining constant from youth to old age. Thus 
devotion may exist without growth. Growth, how- 
ever, cannot come without devotion, for devotion is 
one of the conditions of growth. Other conditions 
being absent, devotion cannot produce growth. We 
will then inquire : What are the conditions of spir- 
itual growth, either in this life or in the life to come ? 
We answer the inquiry thus : Spiritual growth comes 
from the earnest efforts of the soul in pursuit of 
spiritual knowledge; and the conditions of such 
growth are absolute and unhesitating obedience 
springing from a love of obedience, and the highest 
worship which the soul is capable of rendering to its 
Creator. Without these and all of these combined, 
growth in spiritual knowledge is not possible. We 
will consider them briefly. 

The effort required is an effort to learn, founded 
upon a desire and a purpose to know all that it is 
possible to know concerning spiritual truths. Such 



206 THE BOOK OF JOB 

effort is wholly mental. The soul can live superior 
to its physical conditions. It can live in its spiritual 
conditions while yet in physical environment. It 
can use its spiritual powers one and all and thus 
develop them. It can in this manner, in a large 
measure, free its spiritual existence from the dom- 
inating influences of its physical life, and can almost 
make its spiritual the paramount and controlling ex- 
istence. Couple such life with the conditions named, 
absolute and unhesitating obedience springing from 
a love of obedience, and the highest worship which 
the soul is capable of rendering to its Creator, and 
we secure the growth in spiritual knowledge which 
we seek. The effort required needs no further ex- 
planation. The obedience required should need no 
explanation, because all obedience should be founded 
upon a love of obedience. There are, however, some- 
times other motives which lead to actual obedience, 
but which render such obedience unavailing as a 
means of spiritual growth. Of worship we can say 
but little. Its outward forms are as various as are the 
degrees of spiritual growth and understanding. All 
are right and proper and beneficial in their place, 
for those to whom they give pleasure. True worship 
is of the redeemed soul a part ; an exaltation towards 
the life of God ; a conscious inbreathing of the divine 
existence; the conscious knowledge that the love 
which the soul sends forth to its Creator is lost in 
the infinite love with which the everlasting Father 
follows the child. Worship, true spiritual worship, 
is above song, and above prayer ; it is above form and 
above ceremony; it is above appointed place and 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 207 

time; it is of the soul's life a part; it is a conscious 
use of a spiritual power which God bestows upon the 
soul. Worship such as this, I know and you may 
know if it is not now your experience. Through such 
stages and along such way the soul must pass up 
to this third mile-stone of the way of everlasting 
spiritual life, that of spiritual exaltation. When it 
shall have reached this stage then it shall be pre- 
pared to enter into that higher life with God, of 
which mortals can know nothing. Of it we can speak 
only in conjecture. 

Fourth. After spiritual illumination comes spir- 
itual comprehension. This is a stage upon the jour- 
ney of life which we may know as possible for all 
those who persevere and progress in the attainment 
of spiritual knowledge. What it will be we cannot 
assert, for it is certain that no being wholly human 
ever has experienced it in human life. Christ, 
through his divine nature, possessed spiritual com- 
prehension, but Christ could only teach it through 
symbol and metaphor. It is impossible to express 
a spiritual truth by thoughts which are above the 
plane of the existence of him who seeks that truth. 
It can only be declared to such intelligence by symbol 
and metaphor. Who can comprehend God's exist- 
ence but God himself? In childhood we begin to 
learn of this truth through the symbol and metaphor 
of God as a Good Man, the God-Man. A little later 
the symbol and metaphor change to God as a King, 
the King of Kings, clothed with majesty and power. 
Later comes the change to God, the Being, who was 
and is and shall forever be; the Eternal, the Ever- 



208 THE BOOK OF JOB 

lasting One. When we have comprehended this 
thought we have progressed in our comprehension of 
this spiritual truth beyond our first comprehension 
of it, which was of God, the Good Man. This ad- 
vance is but a trifle when compared with that ever- 
lasting progression which must come if we fulfill the 
destiny of God's elect, which destiny is endless search 
after spiritual knowledge and endless progression in 
spiritual comprehension. There is a point along the 
way of our spiritual life at which we shall set up 
this fourth mile-stone, marking the fourth stage of 
that existence. It will be when our spiritual devel- 
opment, our spiritual understanding, shall have 
reached the full measure of the capabilities of the 
spiritual powers bestowed upon that order of intelli- 
gent existence which we call human in its earthly or 
chrysalistic state. What that degree of development 
is we may not now know, simply because we cannot 
now comprehend it. We do, however, know that the 
spiritual powers bestowed upon us are not infinite. 
If not infinite, then they are limited. If limited, 
then of necessity there shall come a period at which 
they shall have reached a state of full development, 
and at that point is set up this fourth imaginary 
mile-stone marking the stages of progress from hu- 
man birth through an endless existence. This much 
is a logical deduction from what we have experienced 
and do now know, and of it we may feel assured. 

Fifth. After spiritual comprehension comes the 
power to impart the knowledge comprehended. Im- 
partation of spiritual knowledge can only follow 
comprehension of spiritual knowledge. Impartation 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 209 

cannot go before comprehension. Therefore all the 
spiritual knowledge which Christ imparted, he him- 
self first comprehended. No other spiritual teacher 
who has ever existed among men has been able to 
impart spiritual knowledge in its completeness be- 
cause no other one has comprehended it in its full- 
ness. Impartation of spiritual knowledge is a power 
which Christ possessed by reason of the perfection 
of his divine attributes; but impartation is always 
limited by the powers of him to whom it is sought 
to impart knowledge. Hence Christ was forced to 
use symbols and metaphors, parables and illustra- 
tions more or less hidden, in order to reach the un- 
derstanding of his hearers. As it was with Christ 
so is it with all revelation of spiritual truth in all 
time and by all methods of revealing it. All revela- 
tion, of all time, of all methods of expression, of 
all degrees and of all forms of expression, constitutes 
one single and perfect work. The understanding 
of that revelation in its entirety, through unceas- 
ing effort, is the destiny of the souls of the saved, 
from their birth into human life to this period of 
full comprehension of which we write. Thereafter 
impartation is their work and their destiny. 

Sixth. Impartation cannot last throughout an 
endless existence, for otherwise it would imply end- 
less creation or absence of progression, both of 
which thoughts are antagonized by the revelation of 
spiritual truth which has been given to us. Accept- 
ing these thoughts as truth, there must of necessity 
follow one more stage in the way of the life of the 
redeemed soul. It is that which we call absorption, 



210 THE BOOK OF JOB 

or oneness with God according to the degree of life 
manifested by the creature. 

Absorption is the last stage of the way of the 
life of the human soul. What is absorption? We 
may know only from what is revealed or rather 
from what we understand of that which is revealed, 
and from what necessarily follows because of that 
which we understand. Absorption is neither the 
death of the soul's life nor the annihilation of the 
soul's individuality, but it is the reunion of both 
with the uncreated life of God from which they 
came. God the Father receives back the child in 
a sense which we cannot now know. It is a state 
of oneness with God just as was and is the life 
and the individuality of Jesus Christ in a state of 
oneness with the eternal life of the Father. It is 
the life, the words, the truth, of Jesus Christ which 
reveals to the soul of man this its ultimate destiny. 
Christ was and is from God, was and is of God, 
was and is a part of, an expression of, God's own 
existence. As such he was one with God, absorbed 
in God. This is not true of Christ when we speak 
of him as a human being for he possessed and mani- 
fested a human individuality. Neither is it true of 
Christ when we speak of him as a spirit, for he 
possesses and manifests to such as can receive the 
manifestation, a spiritual individuality. It is true 
of Christ when we speak of him as a Being, not a 
soul, but a Being above a soul. When we speak of 
the human race we call the individual, the ego, the 
soul, that is the self-conscious self, endowed with 
and manifesting human life. 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 211 

When we speak of Christ, we speak of a Being, 
not of a soul, yet self-conscious in his own exist- 
ence as is the soul, endowed with and manifesting 
the life of the Son, the same being one with the 
life of the Father. It is into such unity of life with- 
out the loss of the individuality of existence, that 
the redeemed soul of man shall enter when it shall 
reach that state of absorption or oneness with God 
which awaits it, there to abide forever. 

That life which is below that degree of intelli- 
gence which may know its Creator, is absorbed into 
the life of its Creator when it ceases to manifest 
itself through its physical existence. This is true 
because such life is powerless to manifest itself 
through any other existence, being unendowed with 
spiritual powers. For such life physical death is sim- 
ply oblivion, rest, inactivity, unconscious unmanifest- 
ed existence, not annihilation. For the soul of man 
which is endowed with spiritual powers through which 
it may know its Creator there is a higher destiny. It 
is that through which we have sought to lead you 
in thought. Its end will not be unlike the end of 
that lower life of which I speak save that with the 
higher the self-consciousness of individual life and 
peace and joy can never be lost. In that oneness 
with God for which we hope and pray and into 
which all who are faithful to the revelation which 
God has given, will most surely enter, we will find 
the fullness of that spiritual joy and peace and purity 
and love, of which to us the earthly life of the Son 
of God was the revelation. Such is the highest, the 
ultimate heaven of the redeemed soul. 



212 THE BOOK OF JOB 

After that God had spoken to Job his soul was 
spiritually illuminated, that is, he received and ac- 
cepted spiritual truth when it was declared unto 
him. Into a knowledge of such truth he grew rapidly 
throughout all the remainder of his earthly exist- 
ence. This is the privilege of all who attain unto 
the state into which Job then entered. When Eli- 
phaz, Bildad and Zophar had been reproved by God 
they repented and by the assistance of Job accepted 
the truths which they had before misunderstood and 
misrepresented. As it was in the days of Job so is it 
in the days in which we live. Eliphaz, Bildad and Zo- 
phar reappear in every land and upon every hand 
to comfort and assist the struggling soul which is 
seeking spiritual knowledge, and with the best of 
purposes they do this by a reiteration of their own 
understanding of revealed spiritual truths. They 
are unable to comfort because their conception of 
spiritual truth is not such as will bring comfort. If 
God speaks to us in a way which makes understand- 
ing easier and the truth plainer, let us listen to the 
voice, whether it be the voice of angel, of spirit, or 
of mortal, or whether it be the voice of God's Holy 
Spirit to our own soul direct. God leads the souls 
of men and speaks his truth to them by ways that 
are not of our choosing. Whether that voice comes 
to us through the silence of death, bringing treasures 
of thought from the great source and fountain of all 
thought, down, down, down, step by step, step by 
step, step by step, through every order and degree 
of intelligence, to this our lowest order and degree, 
transforming the expression of such thoughts 



AN INSPIRED DRAMA 213 

through every order and every degree, down to that 
simplicity of expression, wherein man can alone re- 
ceive them, let us listen to the voice for it is the 
voice of God. 



APR 27 1904 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: June 2005 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township. PA 16066 
(724) 779-21 1 1 



iH 



